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UNIVERSITY 


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foyrnu usy?  tfoupt/  .1'  Cl* 


Henry  Farnam 

'Lt^vhv 


CONTENTS 


I.  To  the  Grandchildren  of  Henry 

Farnam  ......  5 

II.  Memoir  of  Henry  Farnam  by  Henry 


W.  Farnam  : 

1.  Childhood  and  Early  Life,  1803-1825  9 

2.  The  Farmington  Canal  and  the  Canal 

Railroad,  1825-1850  ...  18 

3.  Railroad  Enterprises  in  the  West,  1850- 

1863 .  34 

4.  Retirement,  1863-1883  ...  60 

Appendix .  69 

Notes  .......  90 

III.  Memorial  Sermon  by  Rev.  Newman 

Smyth,  D.D.  .....  95 

IV.  Extracts  from  New  Haven  News¬ 

papers  and  Resolutions  .  .  113 


3 


To  the  Grandchildren  of  Henry  Farnam  : 

The  sketch  of  the  life  of  your  grandfather 
which  fills  the  greater  part  of  the  present  vol¬ 
ume  is  written  especially  for  you.  Besides 
his  own  children,  who  need  no  written  record 
to  tell  them  what  he  was,  none  owe  him  a 
greater  debt  of  gratitude.  Yet  already  his 
character  must  appear  to  your  eyes  tradi¬ 
tional  and  remote.  The  oldest  of  you  was 
but  twelve  years  of  age  at  the  time  of  his 
death ;  the  youngest  has  never  seen  him. 
Your  knowledge  of  him  must  be  derived 
from  others.  Even  his  features  would  be  for¬ 
gotten  by  the  younger  of  your  number,  if 
you  were  not  reminded  of  them  by  his  por¬ 
traits. 

Thus,  while  you  have  the  greatest  possible 
interest  in  knowing  all  you  possibly  can  learn 
about  one  who  loved  you  so  tenderly,  and  who 


did  so  much  for  you,  you  are  at  the  same 
time  in  the  greatest  need  of  such  information 
in  a  permanent  form. 

And  yet  I  cannot  but  feel,  that  what  I  most 
want  to  tell  you  is  the  very  thing  that  I  have 
least  succeeded  in  telling.  For  I  am  not  con¬ 
tent  to  give  you  an  outline  of  the  public  events 
of  your  grandfather’s  life.  What  I  want  to 
make  you  realize,  and  what  I  feel  it  impossible 
to  do  justice  to,  is  the  character  which  lay  back 
of  all  these  activities  ;  the  strong  moral  force, 
which  would  always  have  remained  the  same, 
even  if  your  grandfather  had  been  prevented, 
by  some  of  those  accidents  to  which  great 
commercial  enterprises  are  exposed,  from  see¬ 
ing  the  fruit  of  his  labors. 

It  is  this  character  which  I  would  have  you 
understand.  It  is  this  character  which,  if  you 
can  but  make  it  your  own,  you  will  always 
cherish  as  your  grandfather’s  most  precious 
legacy.  H.  w.  F. 


New  Haven,  July ,  1889. 


MEMOIR 


OF 

Henry  Farnam 


BY 


HENRY  W.  FARNAM 


HENRY  FARNAM 


i. 

CHILDHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE 


1803-1825 


DURING  the  last  quarter  of  the  last  cen¬ 
tury,  probably  between  1778  and  1780,  a 
small  company  of  Connecticut  farmers  left  the 
pleasant  valley  of  the  Thames  to  settle  in  the 
wilderness  west  of  the  Hudson.  At  that  time 
even  the  eastern  part  of  the  State  of  New 
York  was  regarded  as  the  Far  West.  Much 
of  the  land  was  thickly  wooded,  and  those  who 
made  their  homes  there  were  true  pioneers. 
They  had  not  only  to  clear  the  surface  which 
they  expedited  to  till ;  they  had  to  face,  if  neces¬ 
sary,  the  attacks  of  the  Indians.  It  is  believed 
that  the  emigrants  originally  intended  to  set¬ 
tle  in  Wyoming  County,  Pennsylvania,  though 


the  execution  of  any  plans  was  dependent  en¬ 
tirely  upon  circumstances,  and  they  soon  found 
that  they  were  by  no  means  masters  of  the  sit¬ 
uation.  At  one  time,  probably  in  Sullivan  or 
Delaware  County,  they  were  driven  from  their 
homes  and  obliged  to  take  refuge  in  a  fort.  At 
another  time,  probably  near  Neversink,  in  Sulli¬ 
van  County,  they  were  again  brought  to  a  halt 
by  the  news  that  hostile  Indians  were  in  their 
path.  In  this  emergency,  as  my  grandmother 
used  to  relate,  two  of  the  party  volunteered  to 
go  on  as  scouts  and  verify  the  report,  having 
first  agreed  with  their  comrades  that,  if  they 
did  not  return  by  a  certain  time,  the  rest  of  the 
company  were  to  assume  that  they  had  fallen 
and  retreat.  The  scouts  never  came  back,  and 
the  pioneers  were  obliged  to  retrace  their  steps. 
One  of  the  two  scouts  was  Joshua,  the  oldest 
brother  of  my  grandfather,  Jeffrey  Amherst 
Famain. 

His  father,  Eliab  Farnam,  had  brought  with 
him  from  Preston,  Connecticut,  his  wife  and 
children  and,  after  a  period  of  involuntary  wan¬ 
dering,  had  settled  in  Mount  Hope,  Orange 
County,  where  he  spent  the  remainder  of  his 
days.  He  was  joined  here  a  few  years  after 
his  arrival  by  Benjamin  Tracy  of  Norwich) 


with  his  wife  and  eight  children,  and  by  Abiel 
Fry,  with  his  family.  The  three  families  were 
connected  by  marriage.  Eliab  Farnam’s  wife, 
Abigail  Kellnm,  was  the  sister  of  Olive  Kel- 
lnm,  the  wife  of  Benjamin  Tracy,  while  Abiel 
Fry’s  wife  was  Abigail  Tracy,  the  sister  of 
Benjamin  Tracy. 

The  families  united  only  to  be  soon  separated 
again.  The  Frys  moved  further  west  to  Big 
Flats,  on  the  border  line  between  Chemung 
and  Steuben  Counties,  while  the  Traeys  moved 
to  the  town  of  Scipio,  in  Cayuga  County,  and 
bought  a  farm  on  Poplar  Ridge.  This  sepa¬ 
ration  in  space,  however,  did  not  mean  a  loss 
of  interest  in  one  another  or  the  severing  of 
family  ties.  The  Frys  took  with  them  to  Big 
Flats  Mercy  Tracy,  the  fourth  of  Benjamin 
Tracy’s  children,  and  several  years  later  Jeffrey 
Faruam  joined  them  and  spent  the  years  1792 
and  1793  with  them,  working  on  the  farm  in 
summer  and  going  to  school  in  winter.  He 
and  his  twin  brother,  George  Whitfield,  had 
been  born  in  1772  and  belonged  to  a  family  of 
fourteen  children,  of  whom  eight  were  older 
and  four  younger.  There  soon  grew  up  an  in¬ 
timacy  between  Jeffrey  and  his  cousin  Mercy, 
and  in  1793  they  were  married,  he  being  then 


twenty-one  years  of  age,  and  his  bride,  who 
had  been  born  in  1775,  eighteen.  The  young 
couple  spent  the  first  two  years  of  their  mar¬ 
ried  life  in  Big  Flats,  and  it  was  here  that  their 
oldest  child,  Lucinda,  was  born.  In  1795  they 
moved  to  the  town  of  Scipio,  where  the  rest  of 
their  eleven  children  were  born  and  brought 
up,  and  where,  in  1842,  Jeffrey  Farnam  died. 

The  fragments  of  a  diary,  which  he  kept  for 
many  years,  enable  us  to  form  a  pidture  of  the 
life  he  led.  It  was  mainly  one  of  hard  work 
on  his  farm.  The  changes  in  the  weather,  the 
condition  of  the  crops,  the  health  of  his  live 
stock,  are  the  topics  most  often  mentioned. 
He  was  a  regular  attendant  at  church.  The 
monotony  of  his  life  was  occasionally  varied 
by  a  trip  to  Auburn  or  some  more  distant  town 
to  sell  produce,  purchase  supplies,  or  attend 
court.  This  homely  record  of  trivial  events  is 
occasionally  broken  by  a  few  lines  from  a  favor¬ 
ite  hymn  or  a  memorandum  regarding  the  pay¬ 
ment  of  interest  on  a  loan.  There  is  nothing 
exciting  in  the  narrative,  but  the  fadt  that  it 
should  have  been  written  at  all  is  interesting 
and  significant. 

In  1865  my  grandmother  removed  to  Pitts- 
ford,  near  Rochester,  where  she  lived  with  her 


son  George  Washington  until  her  death  in 
1873.  Even  to  the  end  of  her  life  she  was 
noted  for  her  memory,  her  clearness  of  mind, 
her  intelligent  interest  in  public  events,  and 
her  uniform  evenness  of  temper.  When  over 
ninety  years  of  age  she  would  often  relate 
events  which  occurred  in  her  childhood,  recall¬ 
ing  every  detail  with  marvellous  accuracy. 
She  was  as  vigorous  in  body  as  in  mind,  and, 
when  sitting  in  a  chair,  never  made  use  of 
its  back. 

It  was  on  the  Scipio  farm,  November  9,  1803, 
that  Henry  Farnam,  the  sixth  in  a  family  of 
eleven  children,  was  born.  Hike  his  brothers, 
he  was  possessed  of  considerable  physical 
strength  and  showed  great  fondness  for  music, 
the  singing  in  the  village  church  being  mainly 
carried  on  by  the  various  members  of  the  Far¬ 
nam  family.  He  displayed,  however,  at  an 
early  age  a  greater  appetite  for  books  and  a  less 
eager  devotion  to  boyish  sports  than  the  other 
members  of  the  family.  The  two  subjects  that 
most  attracted  him  were  poetry  and  mathe¬ 
matics.  His  memory,  like  that  of  his  mother, 
was  singularly  retentive.  Even  in  his  old  age 
he  could  repeat  many  verses  which  he  had 

committed  as  a  boy,  especially  extracts  from 
13 


Cowper  and  Pope,  who  (perhaps  from  the  acci¬ 
dent  that  their  works  were  most  accessible  to 
him)  were  his  favorite  authors.  His  aptitude 
for  mathematics  was  such  that,  even  with  the 
little  instruction  and  the  few  text-books  he  was 
able  to  command,  he  mastered  the  elements  of 
trigonometry  and  surveying  before  he  was  six¬ 
teen.  When  President  Day’s  Algebra  was  first 
put  into  his  hands,  he  read  it  through  with  the 
eager  interest  with  which  most  boys  read  a 
novel,  so  easy  did  it  seem  to  him  in  compari¬ 
son  with  the  books  that  he  had  studied  before. 
Yet  he  was  often  obliged  to  pursue  these  studies 
in  the  evening,  when,  to  save  the  expense  of  a 
candle,  he  worked  by  the  light  of  the  winter’s 
fire. 

Farm  work  was  never  congenial  to  him,  and 
while  still  a  boy  he  was  sent  to  live  with  Dr. 
Phineas  Hurd,  a  connection  by  marriage,  with 
the  intention  of  studying  medicine.  What  he 
saw  of  the  physician’s  life  did  not,  however, 
arouse  in  him  any  ambition  to  pursue  that 
career,  and  he  returned  to  his  father’s  farm  to 
occupy  himself  with  manual  labor,  to  finish  his 
schooling,  and  later  to  teach  in  the  village 
school  himself. 

The  opportunity  for  a  more  profitable  use  of 


his  talents  soon  came,  and  it  is  significant  that 
his  first  professional  work  was  on  the  earliest 
of  those  great  highways  of  commerce  between 
the  East  and  the  West  to  which  he  was  destined 
in  his  later  life  to  make  such  important  addi¬ 
tions. 

The  Erie  Canal  had  been  begun  in  1817,  and 
the  chief-engineer  of  the  section  west  of  Roch¬ 
ester  was  David  Thomas,  a  Quaker,  with  whom 
my  father  had  become  acquainted  through  his 
relative  Davis  Hurd,  and  to  whom  he  applied 
in  1821  for  a  place  in  his  surveying  party. 
Mr.  Thomas  was  a  man  of  scholarly  attain¬ 
ments.  He  was  particularly  versed  in  pomo¬ 
logy  and  horticulture,  and  his  influence  and 
advice  were  of  great  assistance  to  my  father, 
who  always  entertained  a  warm  affedtion  and 
respedl  for  both  Mr.  Thomas  and  his  wife. 
Eong  after  they  were  gone,  he  took  pleasure  in 
seeing  their  strong  but  kindly  faces  look  down 
upon  him  from  the  walls  of  his  study  in  New 
Haven,  and  I  remember  with  particular  pleas¬ 
ure  a  visit  which  I  once  made  with  him  to  Mrs. 
Thomas  at  Union  Springs,  011  Lake  Cayuga. 
Her  kindly  interest  in  all  his  doings,  her  quaint 
humor,  her  lively  sallies,  and  her  keen  com¬ 
ments  on  all  subjects,  together  with  a  certain 


balance  of  mind  and  sereneness  of  temper,  fully- 
explained  my  father’s  regard  for  this  excellent 
lady. 

My  father  found  in  Mr.  Thomas  a  good 
friend,  but,  when  he  sought  employment  in  his 
party,  there  was  no  vacancy  excepting  in  the 
position  of  camp  cook.  Mr.  Thomas  half  jok¬ 
ingly  offered  him  this  office,  and  to  his  surprise 
it  was  at  once  accepted.  My  father  knew  well 
that  he  would  not  have  to  fill  it  long.  In  a 
short  time  he  became  rodman,  and  in  three 
months  assistant  engineer. 

On  the  return  of  winter  he  came  back  to 
teach  school  at  Scipio,  and  in  March,  1822, 
again  took  his  place  in  the  field.  An  entry  in 
his  father’s  diary  under  date  of  June  11,  1822, 
says  :  “  Heard  from  Henry  for  the  first  time 
since  he  went  away  ;  heard  that  he  was  sick  of 
a  fever  at  Sandy  Creek.” 

The  work  was  indeed  unhealthy,  especially 
when  in  the  fall  of  the  year  he  was  charged 
with  the  construction  of  a  canal  connecting  the 
Tonawanda  and  Oak  Orchard  creeks.  This 
took  him  through  what  has  since  become  one 
of  the  most  fertile  spots  in  the  State,  but  what 
was  then  known  as  “  the  Tonawanda  Swamp,” 
and  the  exposure  to  its  miasmatic  influences 

16 


was  all  but  disastrous  to  his  health.  When  he 
left  the  Erie  Canal  after  its  completion  in  the 
fall  of  1824,  the  malarial  poison  had  so  fastened 
itself  upon  his  system  that  his  family  almost 
despaired  of  his  life. 

In  order,  if  possible,  to  rid  himself  of  this 
complaint,  he  decided  to  try  a  change  of  air  and 
go  back  to  the  State  from  which  his  parents 
had  in  their  childhood  emigrated.  He  was  now 
twenty-one  years  of  age.  Up  to  that  time  his 
services  had,  of  right,  belonged  to  his  father, 
and  he  had  been  able  to  take  the  position  of 
engineer,  only  on  the  condition  of  employing  a 
substitute  on  the  farm.  He  was  now  his  own 
master,  and,  after  another  winter  of  school¬ 
teaching,  he  took  advantage  of  the  offer  of  a 
position  on  the  Farmington  Canal,  and  moved 
in  the  spring  of  1825  to  Connecticut. 


II. 


THE  FARMINGTON  CANAL  AND  THE 
CANAL  RAILROAD 


1825-1850 


HE  twenty-five  years  that  followed  were 


years  of  great  toil,  heavy  responsibility, 
and  small  reward.  They  were  the  long  appren¬ 
ticeship  of  his  life.  Thejr  were  the  period  in 
which  he  laid  painfully  and  slowly  the  founda¬ 
tions  of  character  and  experience  upon  which 
his  later  success  was  to  be  built. 

The  Farmington  Canal  had  been  chartered 
in  1822,  but  it  was  not  put  under  construction 
until  1825,  when  Davis  Hurd  was  appointed 
its  chief-engineer.  It  was  as  his  assistant  that 
my  father  came  to  New  Haven.  Upon  the  re¬ 
tirement  of  Mr.  Hurd  in  1827  my  father  was 
made  chief-engineer,  and  held  this  office  as 
long  as  the  canal  was  in  operation.  The 


Farmington  Canal  was  really  only  the  south¬ 
ern  part  of  a  water  line  which  was  to  extend 
from  Long  Island  Sound  northward  into  Mas¬ 
sachusetts  and  connect  with  the  Connecticut 
River.  The  Farmington  Canal  Company 
operated  the  distance  from  New  Haven  to  the 
State  line  ;  the  Hampshire  and  Hampden  Canal 
Company  operated  the  rest.  The  interests  of 
the  two  companies  were  thus  identified,  and 
their  stocks  were  accordingly  united  in  1826. 
The  canal  was  finished  as  far  as  Farmington  in 
1828,  and  in  1829  there  was  continuous  naviga¬ 
tion  through  the  Hampshire  and  Hampden 
Canal  to  Westfield.  The  line  was  finally  car¬ 
ried  to  Northampton  in  1835. 

Unfortunately  the  company  did  not  prove 
profitable.  I11  1836,  ten  years  after  the  con¬ 
solidation,  if  was  in  such  a  condition  that  it  was 
willing  to  convey  all  of  its  rights  and  franchises 
to  another  organization,  known  as  the  New 
Haven  and  Northampton  Canal  Company,  on 
the  condition  that  the  latter  should  assume  its 
debts.  The  original  stock  was  thus  a  total  loss. 
The  new  company  put  over  $120,000  of  new 
capital  into  the  business,  but  was  no  more 
successful  than  the  old  ones  had  been.  In  1840 
the  sum  sunk  by  the  three  companies  was  esti- 

19 


mated,  according  to  a  history  of  the  canal  pub¬ 
lished  in  1850,  at  $1,377, 156.54. 1 

In  1840  a  further  change  was  made  in  the 
management  of  the  canal  through  the  efforts 
of  Mr.  Joseph  B.  Sheffield,  who  had  now  become 
a  large  stockholder,  and  who  virtually  con¬ 
trolled  the  property  for  the  next  five  years. 
Mr.  Sheffield  had  moved  to  New  Haven  from 
Mobile  in  1835,  and  was  already  a  man  of  large 
property  and  extensive  business  experience. 

The  plan  for  raising  money  which  was  now 
put  into  operation  was  one  originally  proposed 
by  Seth  P.  Staples.  The  city  of  New  Haven 
had,  in  1839,  voted  to  loan  the  canal  company 
$100,000,  secured  by  mortgage,  and  had  made 
a  beginning  in  the  execution  of  this  vote  by 
issuing,  in  the  spring  of  that  year,  $20,000 
worth  of  bonds.  The  company  now  decided 
to  keep  the  remainder  of  the  $100,000  for 
extraordinary  emergencies,  and  to  meet  its 
ordinary  needs  by  assessments  on  the  stock¬ 
holders.  In  default  of  payment  the  stock  was 
to  be  sold  by  the  company.  The  city  thwarted 
the  execution  of  this  plan  in  the  spring  of 
1840  by  voting  not  to  issue  any  more  of  its 
bonds ;  but  at  a  subsequent  meeting,  held  in 
June  of  the  same  year,  it  partly  made  up  for 


this  by  voting  to  pay  $3,000  a  year  for  the  use 
of  the  water. 

Means  were  thus  provided  for  supplying  the 
canal  with  funds,  but  its  balance-sheet  still 
showed  losses.  It  was  able  to  pay  its  ordinary 
expenses  out  of  its  earnings,  but  its  extraordi¬ 
nary  outlays  necessitated  assessments  on  the 
stock.  Many  of  the  stockholders  were  unable 
or  unwilling  to  pay,  and  their  stock  was  sold. 
In  this  way  Mr.  Sheffield  gradually  acquired 
more  of  it,  and  in  time  became  almost  the  sole 
owner  of  the  canal.  The  extraordinary  outlays 
were  most  frequently  caused  by  freshets,  which 
broke  the  banks  and  necessitated  expensive 
repairs.  Once,  however,  in  1844,  considerable 
loss  was  caused  by  a  drought,  which  suspended 
navigation  entirely. 

Mr.  Sheffield  found  little  satisfaction  in  this 
kind  of  business.  In  1845  he  sold  the  greater 
part  of  his  stock,  and  withdrew  from  the  presi¬ 
dency  and  directorate  of  the  company. 

During  all  this  time  my  father  aCted  as  chief- 
engineer  and  superintendent.  He  was  con¬ 
stantly  traveling  up  and  down  the  line  of  the 
canal  in  his  buggy,  called  hither  and  thither 
by  sudden  and  unlooked-for  emergencies.  By 
night  and  by  day,  in  rain  and  in  shine,  he  re- 


sponded  promptly  to  whatever  demands  were 
made  upon  him,  and  at  the  same  time  he  was 
often  obliged  to  provide  for  raising  the  funds 
needed  to  pay  operating  expenses. 

The  weight  of  the  responsibility  which  rested 
upon  him  and  the  anxious  care  with  which  he 
bore  it  are  illustrated  by  a  curious  fadl.  In  his 
later  years,  long  after  he  had  given  up  adlive 
business,  if  by  chance  his  usually  sound  and 
health}^  sleep  was  disturbed  by  a  distressing 
dream,  his  imagination  almost  always  reverted 
to  the  days  of  the  canal.  He  would  often  say, 
when  he  awoke  in  the  morning  after  such  a 
night,  “  I  have  been  spending  the  whole  night 
repairing  a  breach  in  the  old  canal.” 

Great  efforts  were  made  to  maintain  this 
enterprise.  Two  of  the  New  Haven  banks, 
the  City  Bank  and  the  Mechanics’  Bank,  had 
received  their  charters  as  the  price  of  their 
support,  and  the  most  skillful  and  careful 
management  had  been  applied  to  the  work. 
Its  failure  seems  to  have  been  due  to  unavoid¬ 
able  natural  causes.  In  the  historical  sketch 
of  the  canal,  published  under  Mr.  Sheffield’s 
direction  in  1850,  two  fadls  are  advanced  to  ac¬ 
count  for  the  generally  unprofitable  character 
of  New  England  canals.  One  was  that  they 


could  never  get  any  large  share  of  the  passen¬ 
ger  travel ;  the  other  was  that,  as  they  never 
carried  on  transportation  themselves  but  sim¬ 
ply  collected  tolls,  it  required  a  much  larger 
volume  of  business  to  pay  dividends  than 
would  be  required  by  a  railroad.  Besides 
these  causes,  the  growing  competition  of  the 
railroads  had,  at  the  end  of  this  period,  its  part 
in  preventing  the  canals  from  sharing  in  the 
increasing  business  of  the  State. 

The  problem  which  confronted  the  stock¬ 
holders  of  the  canal  in  1845  was,  therefore,  to 
make  some  use  of  their  property  which  would 
prevent  it  from  becoming  a  total  loss,  since 
twenty  years  of  experience  had  demonstrated 
that  a  canal  would  not  pay.  The  first  sug¬ 
gestion  of  a  feasible  plan  for  accomplishing 
this  end  was  made,  according  to  Mr.  Sheffield’s 
statement,  by  my  father,  who  proposed  that  a 
railroad  should  be  built  along  the  line  of  the 
canal,  and  the  canal  itself  abandoned.  This 
measure  would  evidently  save  the  expense  of 
acquiring  the  right  of  way  and  of  doing  a 
great  deal  of  the  grading  and  would,  at  the 
same  time,  substitute  for  the  antiquated  canal 
a  more  efficient  means  of  communication. 

Mr.  Sheffield  brought  this  idea  to  public  at- 

23 


tention  by  an  anonymous  communication  in 
one  of  the  New  Haven  newspapers  in  the 
spring  of  1845,  his  intention  being  to  make 
the  road  a  new  route  to  Hartford  by  waj^  of 
Plainville.  He  was,  at  the  time,  actively  en¬ 
gaged  in  organizing  the  New  York  and  New 
Haven  Railroad,  but  he  was  so  much  impressed 
with  the  advantages  of  this  plan  for  using  the 
canal  that  he  bought  back,  at  an  enhanced 
price,  the  stock  which  he  had  sold  in  1845. 
He  again  became  president  of  the  company, 
and  in  February,  1846,  the  directors  voted  to 
adopt  the  plan.  My  father  continued  to  act 
as  chief-engineer  and  superintendent  of  the 
company.  Work  was  begun  upon  the  rail¬ 
road  in  January,  1847,  an<^  pushed  rapidly  for¬ 
ward  under  his  direction.  In  January,  1848, 
the  road  was  opened  to  Plainville,  and  in 
1850,  to  Tariffville  and  Collinsville.  Most  of 
the  capital  for  this  enterprise  was  furnished 
by  Mr.  Sheffield. 

The  new  road  had,  of  course,  to  meet  the 
competition  of  the  New  Haven  and  Hartford 
road,  and  the  rivalry  between  the  capitals  of 
the  State  led  to  some  trying  complications, 
into  the  details  of  which  it  is  needless  to  en¬ 
ter.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  Mr.  Sheffield  leased 


the  Northampton  Railroad  in  1850  to  the  New 
York  and  New  Haven  Railroad,  on  the  under¬ 
standing  that  he  was  to  extend  the  line  north¬ 
ward  to  Springfield,  if  desired.  While  the  bill 
for  securing  the  necessary  charter  for  the  ex¬ 
tension  was  before  the  Massachusetts  legisla¬ 
ture,  and  after  the  contract  had  been  made  for 
building  the  road  to  the  State  line,  the  New 
Haven  and  Hartford  road  succeeded  in  making 
a  contract  with  the  New  York  road  which 
made  all  of  Mr.  Sheffield’s  work  unnecessary 
and  entirely  blocked  his  plans.  Disappointed 
in  those  whom  he  had  trusted,  Mr.  Sheffield 
settled  with  his  contractors,  sold  his  stock  in 
the  New  York  road,  resigned  from  the  direct¬ 
orate,  and  gave  up  for  the  time  all  aCtive  inter¬ 
est  in  railroading  in  the  Hast.  At  the  same 
time  my  father  resigned  his  position  in  the 
New  Haven  and  Northampton  Company,  and 
both  men  were  now  at  liberty  to  turn  their  at¬ 
tention  to  a  field  which  offered  a  better  oppor¬ 
tunity  for  the  use  of  their  talents. 

Though  continuously  employed  by  the 
Northampton  Company  during  a  quarter  of  a 
century,  my  father  had  found  time  to  take  an 
adtive  part  in  the  inauguration  of  the  road  to 
New  York.  The  road  from  New  Haven  to 


25 


Hartford  had  been  chartered  in  1833  and 
opened  to  Hartford  in  1839,  bnt  communica¬ 
tion  with  the  metropolis  was  still  kept  np  by 
means  of  steamboats.  The  first  suggestion  of 
a  road  to  New  York  seems  to  have  been  made 
by  Mr.  Sheffield,  who  was  a  director  in  the 
New  Haven  and  Hartford  road,  and  who  pre¬ 
sented  the  idea  to  his  fellow-diredtor,  Judge 
Hitchcock.  The  latter  regarded  the  scheme 
as  visionary  bnt,  at  Mr.  Sheffield’s  solicitation, 
obtained  in  1844  a  charter  incorporating, 
among  other  men,  Mr.  Sheffield  and  Mr.  Far- 
nam  as  a  company  to  build  the  road.  When 
the  books  were  opened  for  subscriptions,  Mr. 
Sheffield  put  down  his  name  for  one  hundred 
shares,  Judge  Hitchcock  for  ten,  and  my 
father  for  twenty.  Beyond  this,  not  a  single 
share  was  taken ;  the  plan  was  still  regarded 
by  the  mass  of  the  people  as  visionary.  After 
further  efforts  to  get  support  from  capitalists, 
and  after  subscribing  more  himself,  Mr.  Shef¬ 
field  went  in  1845  to  Europe,  in  order,  if  pos¬ 
sible,  to  interest  foreign  capitalists,  especially 
the  firm  of  Baring  Bros.,  in  the  enterprise, 
while  my  father  was  doing  some  preliminary 
engineering  work  on  the  line.  Mr.  Sheffield 
says  in  his  memoranda  : 


26 


“In  the  meantime,  my  friend  Mr.  Henry  Farnam, 
with  blank  deeds  (prepared  by  Judge  Hitchcock),  with 
his  accustomed  zeal  and  energy,  had  taken  Twining’ s 
Report,  and  with  his  own  horse  and  buggy  had  travelled 
the  whole  line  and  had  successfully  negotiated  for  the 
right  of  way  for  about  three  hundred  out  of  the  four 
hundred  and  twenty  claims  between  West  River  at  New 
Haven  and  the  State  line  ;  the  others  were  cases  of 
minors,  non-residents,  etc.  For  his  own  time  and 
services,  not  even  for  his  own  expenses,  did  Mr.  Far¬ 
nam  make  any  charge  whatever.’’ 

Though  prevented  by  his  work  on  the  canal 
from  taking  any  further  part  in  the  New  York 
road,  my  father  had  the  satisfaction  of  having 
been  one  of  its  original  incorporators  and  of 
having  done  much  of  the  work  preparatory  to 
its  construction. 

This  period  of  my  father’s  life  was  beset 
with  many  discouragements.  He  had  to  work 
hard  in  the  service  of  a  company  which  was  a 
constant  drain  upon  its  owners  and  the  cause 
of  much  contention  and  complaint  on  the  part 
of  New  Haven  people.  He  had  done  this  with 
no  material  reward  beyond  a  small  salary.  As 
Mr.  Sheffield  says,  in  speaking  of  the  losses  of 
New  Haven  people  by  the  canal : 

“  No  man  in  Connecticut  lost  as  much  as  Mr.  Far¬ 
nam,  for  he  lost  not  only  all  that  he  had  invested  in 

27 


its  stock  (which  was  all  he  had  saved  of  his  hard  earn¬ 
ings  in  former  years),  but  he  lost  ten  or  twelve  years 
of  the  prime  of  life,  when  he  might  elsewhere  have 
received  large  salaries  as  engineer.” 

These  years  were  hard,  and  yet  they  brought 
some  compensating  advantages.  In  the  first 
place,  my  father  won  the  esteem  of  all  his  ac¬ 
quaintances  for  his  skill  as  an  engineer,  for 
his  judgment  in  business,  for  his  honesty  and 
nobility  of  character,  and  for  his  liberality. 
His  standing  in  the  community  is  seen  in  the 
following  resolutions,  that  were  passed  at  a 
meeting  of  the  stockholders  of  the  New 
Haven  and  Northampton  Company,  upon  his 
retirement  in  1850: 

“  Whereas,  Mr.  Henry  Farnam  has  been  employed 
for  the  last  twenty-five  years  in  connection  with  the 
works  of  internal  improvement  in  the  Farmington 
Valley,  first,  for  eleven  years  of  this  time,  in  the  ser¬ 
vice  of  the  Farmington  Canal  Company,  and  for  the 
remainder  as  Superintendent  and  Chief  Engineer  of 
the  New  Haven  and  Northampton  Company,  from  its 
organization  in  1836  ;  and 

Whereas,  having  brought  to  a  termination  the 
public  works  which  have  been  constructing  under 
his  supervision,  he  now  tenders  his  resignation  to 
this  Company  : 


28 


Be  it  resolved ,  That  for  the  uniform  fidelity  with 
which  Mr.  Farnam  has  performed  all  the  duties  de¬ 
volving  upon  him  ;  for  the  unimpeachable  integrity 
with  which  the  many  thousand  dollars,  that  have 
passed  through  his  hands,  have  been  expended  ;  for 
the  unshaken  confidence  with  which  he  carried  for¬ 
ward  these  works  under  very  great  difficulties  ;  and 
for  the  heavy  personal  responsibility  which  he  often 
assumed  to  maintain  the  works,  when  otherwise  they 
would  have  been  sacrificed,  this  Company  entertain 
the  highest  consideration,  and  that  the  President  be 
directed  to  express,  in  writing,  to  Mr.  Farnam  our 
sentiments  to  this  effeCt,  together  with  our  congratu¬ 
lation  upon  the  triumphant  success  of  the  enterprise 
in  which  he  has  been  so  long  engaged. 

Resolved ,  That  the  President  and  Directors  of  the 
New  York  and  New  Haven  Company  be  requested  to 
furnish  Mr.  Farnam  with  a  Director's  ticket  during 
the  continuance  of  their  leases. 

Resolved ,  That  the  President  and  Directors  be  au¬ 
thorized  and  directed  to  procure  some  proper  testimo¬ 
nial  of  our  sense  of  the  services  Mr.  Farnam  has 
rendered  this  Company.” 

The  canal  was  also  the  means  of  bringing 
him  into  close  personal  relations  with  a  num¬ 
ber  of  men  npon  whose  friendship  he  looked 
back  in  later  years  with  unmixed  satisfaction, 
and  whose  example  was  undoubtedly  of  great 
influence  in  molding  his  own  character. 

29 


Foremost  among  these  was  James  Hillhouse, 
whose  ereCt  carriage,  straight  nose,  high  cheek 
bones,  and  swarthy  complexion  had  made  him 
familiarly  known  as  the  Old  Sachem.  His 
portrait  hangs  fittingly  above  my  father’s  in 
Alumni  Hall,  and  it  was  always  a  delight  to  my 
father,  that  he  should  have  built  the  home  of 
his  old  age  upon  the  street  which  bears  the 
name  of  his  early  friend  and  benefactor.  In  the 
year  in  which  my  father  came  to  New  Haven, 
Mr.  Hillhouse  was  the  superintendent  of  the 
Farmington  Canal  and  one  of  its  directors. 
It  fell  to  my  father’s  lot,  therefore,  to  make 
many  journeys  in  his  company,  while  the  line 
was  being  surveyed  and  the  work  pushed  for¬ 
ward.  This  contaCI  in  business  soon  grew  into 
a  relation  of  mutual  confidence  and  friend¬ 
ship.  Mr.  Hillhouse  was  at  that  time  in  his 
seventy-first  year.  He  had  sat  in  Congress, 
he  had  been  four  times  eleCted  to  the  Federal 
Senate,  and  he  had  earned  a  wide  reputation 
as  a  financier  while  aCting  as  Commissioner  of 
the  Connecticut  School  Fund.  He  was,  until 
the  day  of  his  death,  Treasurer  of  Yale  Col¬ 
lege.  He  has  left  a  noble  monument  of  his 
public  spirit  and  foresight  in  the  inner  row  of 
trees  upon  the  Green,  and  in  the  avenue  called 

30 


by  his  name,  which  he  cut  through  his  farm 
and  planted  with  elms.  He  was  universally 
respedted  and  loved  for  his  ability,  his  integ¬ 
rity,  and  his  public  spirit. 

Mr.  Hillliouse  died  in  1832.  My  father  en¬ 
joyed  his  acquaintance,  therefore,  only  seven 
years;  but  the  friendship  of  this  noble  man, 
nearly  fifty  years  his  senior,  was  an  inspira¬ 
tion  and  a  help  throughout  his  life. 

It  was  during  this  period,  also,  that  my 
father  became  acquainted  with  Joseph  H-  Shef¬ 
field,  whose  name  will  occur  frequently  in 
these  pages.  Mr.  Sheffield  was  a  man  cast  in 
a  classic  mold  ;  a  man  of  impressive  appear¬ 
ance,  clean-cut,  handsome  features,  vigorous 
health,  and  a  clear  mind.  He  was  a  thorough 
business  man,  skilled  in  the  details  of  com¬ 
mercial  life,  yet  large  in  all  his  views,  and  en¬ 
dowed  with  that  rare  faculty  of  being  able  to 
grasp  any  business  combination  in  its  remoter 
bearings.  Mr.  Sheffield  and  my  father  sup¬ 
plemented  each  other  admirably  in  the  work 
which  they  subsequently  carried  out,  the  for¬ 
mer  generally  attending  to  all  matters  of 
finance,  the  latter  dealing  with  the  practical 
work  in  the  field.  The  business  relations 
which  had  begun  on  the  old  canal  were  des- 


tined  to  grow  into  a  partnership  which  led  to 
great  enterprises  and  the  handling  of  many 
millions  of  dollars.  Yet  in  all  these  compli¬ 
cated  and  often  trying  affairs,  no  disagreement 
ever  seems  to  have  arisen  between  the  partners, 
and  to  their  commercial  relations  were  added 
an  intimacy  and  friendship  which  nothing  ever 
marred.  Even  in  the  retirement  of  their  de¬ 
clining  }^ears,  this  same  harmonious  eo-opera- 
tion  continued ;  both  finally  established  their 
homes  upon  the  same  street,  and  both  found 
one  of  their  greatest  pleasures  in  their  bene¬ 
factions  to  Yale  College. 

Their  relations  to  one  another  are  well  epit¬ 
omized  by  Mr.  Sheffield  in  a  letter  dated  July 
9,  1855,  enclosing  a  final  settlement  of  the  ac¬ 
counts  relative  to  the  building  of  the  Chicago 
and  Rock  Island  Railroad,  in  which  he  says : 

“  In  closing  these  accounts  of  millions  between  us, 
it  must  be  a  pleasing  reflection  to  you,  as  it  is  to  me, 
that  we  have  worked  together  with  mutual  confidence, 
faith  and  zeal,  and  that  we  amicably  close  them  with 
the  same  kind  feeling,  high  respect,  and  confidence 
with  which  we  commenced,  some  dozen  years  ago.” 

Finally  it  was  during  these  years  that  my 
father  laid  the  foundations  of  that  home  in 
which  he  found  such  solace  and  comfort,  and 

32 


in  which  his  presence  was  a  constant  bless¬ 
ing. 

At  the  time  of  his  marriage,  in  1839,  he  was 
thirty-six  years  old.  My  mother,  Ann  Sophia 
Whitman,  of  Farmington,  was  thirteen  years 
younger.  All  of  his  five  children  were  born 
in  the  house  on  Chapel  street  into  which  he 
moved  soon  after  his  marriage,  and  from  which, 
even  in  the  many  changes  of  residence  which 
he  subsequently  made,  he  never  parted. 

Though  he  possessed  little  in  the  way  of 
accumulated  property  at  the  time  of  his  retire¬ 
ment  from  the  Northampton  Company,  and 
though  he  had  always  been  dependent  upon  a 
small  salary  for  his  support,  he  was  known, 
even  then,  as  one  who  gave  as  liberally  to  pub¬ 
lic  objects  as  his  means  would  allow,  and  whose 
hand  was  always  open  to  help  the  poor. 


33 


III. 


RAILROAD  ENTERPRISES  IN  THE 
WEST 


1850-1863 


HE  period  that  follows  was  in  sharp  cou- 


A-  trast  with  that  just  passed.  Twenty-five 
years  had  now  been  devoted  to  the  service  of 
one  company.  During  the  next  six  years  my 
father  had  charge  of  the  construction  of  four 
railroads  ;  he  designed  and  built  the  first  bridge 
over  the  Mississippi  River ;  and  he  became  the 
president  of  the  leading  railroad  system  of  the 
North-west. 

Quick  to  appreciate  the  importance  which 
railroads  were  to  play  in  the  economic  develop¬ 
ment  of  the  country,  he  had  given  proof  of  his 
foresight  in  being  one  of  the  incorporators  of 
the  New  York  road,  and  in  suggesting  the  New 
Haven  and  Northampton  Railroad  as  a  substi- 


34 


tute  for  the  canal.  He  showed  equal  prescience 
in  seeing  that  the  great  field  for  building 
railroads  lay  in  the  West,  and  that  those  who 
wished  to  operate  upon  a  large  scale  would  find 
there  abundant  opportunities. 

His  first  visit  to  the  West  was  made  in  the 
fall  of  1850,  when  he  went  out  at  the  invitation 
of  Mr.  William  B.  Ogden.  Mr.  Ogden  was 
president  of  the  Galena  and  Chicago  Union 
Railroad,  which  was  then  in  operation  only  as 
far  as  Elgin,  and  he  hoped  to  interest  my 
father  in  his  enterprises. 

Chicago  was  at  that  time  a  town  of  less  than 
30,000  inhabitants,  but  little  larger  than  New 
Haven,  which  had  about  22,500.  It  had  been 
incorporated  thirteen  years  before,  when  it  was 
a  village  of  4,000.  It  was  even  then  an  un¬ 
substantial  settlement,  built  on  swampy  land 
about  the  almost  stagnant  strip  of  water  known 
as  the  Chicago  River,  admirably  located  for  the 
terminus  of  steamboat  navigation  on  the  lake, 
but  otherwise  possessing  few  attractions. 

The  only  railroad  entering  Chicago  was  the 
fragment  of  the  Galena  and  Chicago  Union, 
forty-two  miles  long.  Since  1848,  the  Illinois 
and  Michigan  Canal  had  connected  the  city 
with  the  Illinois  River  at  La  Salle,  and  so  put 

35 


it  into  communication  with  the  Mississippi, 
before  there  was  any  railroad  connection  with 
the  seaboard.  Those  who  visited  the  city 
from  the  Bast  could  travel  by  rail  no  further 
than  New  Buffalo,  on  Lake  Michigan,  about 
forty-eight  miles  across  the  lake.  The  Michi¬ 
gan  Southern  Railroad  had  proceeded  no  fur¬ 
ther  westward  than  Hillsdale,  about  one  hun¬ 
dred  and  sixty-seven  miles  from  Chicago. 

My  father  was  much  impressed  with  the 
possibilities  of  the  country  that  he  saw.  Before 
committing  himself  to  any  projeCt,  however,  he 
made  a  second  visit  in  the  same  year,  this  time 
in  company  with  Mr.  Sheffield,  and  now  pushed 
as  far  as  Rock  Island,  on  the  Mississippi  River. 
Rock  Island  already  boasted  of  being  the  ter¬ 
minus  of  a  railroad,  the  Rock  Island  and  La 
Salle,  which  had  been  chartered  in  1847.  But 
the  road  existed  only  011  paper. 

Mr.  Sheffield  and  my  father  saw  at  once  that 
it  would  be  hopeless  to  make  much  of  this  road, 
unless  the  charter  were  so  amended  as  to  allow 
it  to  run  through  to  Chicago,  instead  of  stopping 
at  La  Salle  and  there  connecting  with  the 
canal ;  but  they  at  once  agreed  that,  if  a  favor¬ 
able  amendment  to  the  charter  could  be  ob¬ 
tained,  they  would  contraCl  to  build  the  road. 

36 


In  looking  back  over  this  period,  we  are  apt  to 
think  it  odd  that  a  railroad  was  planned  from 
Rock  Island  to  La  Salle,  before  one  was  con¬ 
structed  from  Chicago  to  La  Salle,  and  that  the 
road  from  Chicago  to  Rock  Island  should  have 
been  projected,  before  there  was  a  single  rail 
connecting  Chicago  with  the  East.  But  the 
idea  seemed  then  to  prevail  that,  where  water 
communication  was  possible,  railroads  were 
unnecessary  ;  hence  the  road  between  La  Salle 
and  Rock  Island  was  regarded  as  a  mere  exten¬ 
sion  of  the  canal,  while  the  road  from  Chicago 
to  Rock  Island  was  a  mere  extension  of  the 
water  communication  which  Chicago  had  with 
the  East  through  the  Great  Lakes.  We  find 
the  same  anomaly  in  Connecticut,  where  the 
road  from  New  Haven  to  Hartford  was  built 
before  the  road  from  New  York  to  New  Haven, 
and  where  Mr.  Sheffield’s  plan  of  running  a 
railroad  to  New  York,  parallel  to  the  steamboat 
route  of  the  Sound,  was  regarded  as  visionary. 
As  matters  finally  turned  out,  Chicago  did  get 
her  railroad  communication  with  the  East,  be¬ 
fore  the  rails  had  connedled  her  with  the  Missis¬ 
sippi,  but  this  was  almost  bj7  accident. 

The  Michigan  Southern  Railroad  had  come 
to  a  standstill  at  Hillsdale ;  its  financial  con- 

37 


dition  was  very  weak,  and  but  four  miles  of 
road  had  been  built  in  1850.  Mr.  John  B. 
Jervis,  who  was  then  chief-engineer  of  the  road, 
wrote  to  my  father  on  the  4th  of  December, 
1850,  offering  him  the  position  of  superinten¬ 
dent  of  that  portion  of  the  road  which  was 
already  in  operation.  Both  the  original  letter 
and  my  father’s  reply  have  been  preserved,  and 
they  show  that  this  was  the  beginning  of  the 
acquaintance  of  the  two  men.  My  father’s 
answer,  which  was  brief,  said  that  he  could  not 
accept  the  post,  but  that  he  would  explain  his 
reasons  for  declining,  when  he  should  see  Mr. 
Jervis  in  New  York.  The  upshot  of  their  con¬ 
versation,  when  they  met,  seems  to  have  been 
that  my  father,  while  declining  to  superintend 
the  part  of  the  road  that  was  then  built,  said 
that  he  was  quite  willing  to  build  that  portion 
which  was  yet  unfinished,  and  furnish  the  cap¬ 
ital  for  doing  it.  The  proposition  was  thought 
to  be  a  daring  one,  for,  on  the  one  hand,  there 
was  a  considerable  jealousy  of  eastern  men  in 
the  West,  which  caused  many  obstacles  to  be 
thrown  in  their  path,  and,  on  the  other  hand, 
there  was  a  great  distrust  of  western  enterprises 
among  eastern  capitalists.  Railroads  which 
are  now  regarded  as  sound  and  conservative 


investments  were  then  considered  wild  specu¬ 
lations. 

The  proposition,  however  bold,  was  too  good 
to  be  rejected.  The  contract  was  made  with 
the  firm  of  Sheffield  and  Farnam,  work  was  be¬ 
gun,  and  in  March,  1852,  the  first  locomotive 
entered  Chicago  from  the  Hast  over  the  rails  of 
the  Michigan  Southern  road.2 

Shortly  afterward,  the  Michigan  Central 
Railroad,  which  had  been  racing  with  the  Mich¬ 
igan  Southern,  also  entered  the  city,  and  under 
the  influence  of  this  stimulus  the  population 
increased,  the  price  of  real  estate  rose,  and 
Chicago  was  in  a  whirl  of  excitement.  My 
father  used  to  say  that  building  a  railroad 
into  Chicago  would  be  like  “  tapping  lake  Erie 
imder  a  forty  foot  head,”  and  his  prediction 
was  amply  verified. 

The  coustruCtion  of  the  Michigan  Southern 
Railroad  was  but  the  preface  to  the  main  work 
for  which  my  father  went  to  Chicago.  The 
task  that  now  confronted  him  was,  first  to 
build  a  road  from  Chicago  to  the  Mississippi, 
and  then  to  carry  it  further,  and  open  the  way 
for  the  first  railroad  across  the  continent. 

The  firm  of  Sheffield  and  Farnam  had  agreed 
to  build  the  road  from  Chicago  to  Rock  Island 


39 


and  furnish  the  capital,  provided  the  charter  of 
the  Rock  Island  and  La  Salle  Railroad  could 
be  suitably  amended.  This  was  not  easily  ac¬ 
complished,  for  the  canal  interests  were  strong 
in  the  State,  and  naturally  opposed  a  railroad 
which  would  parallel  the  canal  from  La  Salle 
to  Chicago.  It  was  evident  at  an  earl}r  day, 
that  the  charter  could  not  be  obtained  without 
some  compromise.  In  a  letter  written  January 
22,  1851,  to  the  Hon.  James  Grant,  while  the 
bill  was  still  before  the  legislature,  my  father 
says  : 

‘ 1  Be  sure  to  get  the  charter  to  make  the  road  on  the 
shortest  route  from  L,a  Salle  to  Chicago,  even  if  they 
insist  011  your  paying  tolls  on  freights  taken  from 
points  along  the  canal.” 

Through  the  efforts  of  Judge  Grant  the  char¬ 
ter  was  finally  obtained,  though  burdened  with 
the  payment  of  tribute  to  the  canal.  During 
the  open  season,  when  canal  navigation  was 
carried  on,  the  road  had  to  pay  tolls  on  all  busi¬ 
ness  taken  from  or  destined  to  an y  point  on  the 
Illinois  and  Michigan  Canal  or  twenty  miles 
west  of  its  termination  at  La  Salle.  This  was 
subject  to  certain  limitations.  The  road  was 
to  be  released,  as  soon  as  any  other  road  carried 
free  of  tolls,  and  it  was  also  to  be  released,  when- 

40 


ever  the  interest  on  the  State  debt  should  be 
provided  for.  On  the  other  hand,  the  road  was 
to  obtain  the  right  of  way  through  canal  lands 
and  State  lands,  and  its  taxes  were  to  be  de¬ 
ducted  from  its  tolls.  The  charter  once  ob¬ 
tained,  in  the  beginning  of  1851,  the  construc¬ 
tion  of  the  road  was  pushed  with  great  energy. 
The  railroad  was  re-christened  as  the  Chicago 
and  Rock  Island  Railroad.  In  April,  1851, 
John  B.  Jervis  was  chosen  its  president,  and 
William  Jervis,  its  chief-engineer.  In  August 
the  surveys  had  been  completed  ;  before  the 
end  of  the  month  the  terms  of  the  contraCt  with 
Sheffield  and  Farnam  had  been  agreed  upon, 
and  on  September  17th  they  were  approved  by 
the  Board  of  Directors.  In  the  beginning  of 
the  following  spring,  April  10,  1852,  work  was 
begun  ;  on  the  2 2d  of  February,  1854,  the  first 
train  passed  over  the  rails  from  Chicago  to 
Rock  Island,  and  on  the  10th  of  July  the  road 
was  formally  turned  over  to  the  company,  some 
eighteen  months  before  the  time  specified  in  the 
contraCt. 

The  terms  of  the  contraCt  are  interesting  as 
showing,  how  lunch  was  done  by  the  contractors, 
and  how  little,  comparatively,  by  the  company. 
The  former  agreed  to  bnild  and  equip  the  entire 

4i 


line  for  the  gross  sum  of  $3,987,688.  Of  this 
sum  $2,000,000  were  to  be  paid  in  seven  per 
cent,  bonds  at  par,  and  $500,000  in  cash  at  the 
rate  of  $25,000  a  month,  while  the  balance  of 
$1,487,688  was  to  be  paid  in  certificates  of  stock 
at  par,  bearing  ten  per  cent,  interest  and  con¬ 
vertible  into  stock  on  the  completion  of  the 
road. 

The  effedl  of  the  opening  of  traffic  was  what 
might  have  been  expedted  from  the  results  seen 
in  the  case  of  the  Michigan  Southern  Railroad. 
The  rush  of  travel  was  so  great  that,  even  be¬ 
fore  the  completion  of  the  road,  it  was  necessary 
to  increase  the  equipment.  In  this  way  the 
final  expense  was  brought  to  about  $4,500,000. 

The  report  of  the  directors  for  1853,  made 
before  the  road  was  completed,  says  : 

1  ‘  It  was  originally  supposed  that  one  daily  through 
train,  with  one  additional  train,  between  Chicago  and 
Peru,  would  accommodate  the  passenger  business,  and 
that  the  same  number  of  freight  trains  would  do  all  the 
freight  business  for  the  first  year  after  the  road  was 
completed,  but  there  are  two  daily  passenger  trains 
running  between  Chicago  and  Peru,  and  one  to  the  end 
of  the  track,  one  daily  freight  train  to  the  end  of  the 
track,  and  an  extra  train  as  often  as  the  machinery  can 
be  spared  to  run  it,  besides  the  regular  construction 
trains.” 


42 


The  original  contract  had  provided  for  eigh¬ 
teen  locomotives  of  from  sixteen  to  eighteen 
tons  each,  twelve  passenger  cars,  one  hundred 
and  fifty  covered  freight  cars,  one  hundred 
platform  cars,  etc.  But  the  rush  of  business 
was  so  great  that  this  allowance  had  to  be  con¬ 
stantly  exceeded,  as  the  work  progressed,  and 
on  the  ioth  of  July  the  road  had  twenty-eight 
locomotives,  twenty-four  first-class  passenger 
cars,  four  second-class  passenger  cars,  one  hun¬ 
dred  and  seventy  covered  freight  cars,  one  hun¬ 
dred  and  seventy  platform  cars,  and  other 
things  in  proportion.  In  addition  to  this,  the 
president  and  executive  committee  had  al¬ 
ready  contracted  for  ten  additional  locomotives, 
while  at  the  time  of  making  the  report,  it  was 
proposed  to  buy  eight  more.  The  report  well 
says  : 

“  When  it  is  recollected  that  three  years  ago,  when 
the  road  was  located,  a  large  portion  of  the  line  tra¬ 
versed  was  then  open  prairie,  and  that  even  now  only  a 
small  part  of  the  country  along  the  line  of  the  road  is 
under  cultivation,  and  seeing  the  business  already  de¬ 
veloped,  it  is  almost  impossible  for  any  one  who  has 
any  regard  for  his  judgment,  to  make  an  estimate  suffi¬ 
ciently  large  to  meet  the  increase  of  business.” 


43 


During  the  first  half  year  from  July  io,  1854, 
to  January  10,  1855,  the  earnings  exceeded  the 
running  expenses  by  $270,894,  or  nearly  nine 
per  cent,  on  the  capital  stock.  During  the  five 
months  ending  December,  the  road  carried  168, 
825  passengers  and  49,735.82  tons  of  freight. 

While  the  main  line  of  the  Chicago  and  Rock 
Island  Railroad  was  being  constructed,  my 
father  was  engaged  in  pushing  a  branch  south¬ 
wards  to  Peoria.  This  branch  was  organized 
as  a  separate  corporation,  the  Peoria  and  Bu¬ 
reau  Valley  Railroad,  and  joined  the  Rock 
Island  road  at  Bureau  J unCtion.  It  ran  through 
a  large  portion  of  the  fertile  valley  of  the  Illi¬ 
nois  River,  and  thus  became  a  valuable  feeder 
to  the  Rock  Island  road,  to  which  it  Avas  leased 
in  1854.  It  was  the  intention  from  the  begin¬ 
ning  to  put  the  two  roads  under  the  same  man¬ 
agement,  and  it  AA^as  merely  as  a  matter  of  con¬ 
venience  that  a  separate  company  was  organ¬ 
ized.  This  branch  was  pushed  through  with 
the  same  rapidity  that  Avas  shoAA’n  in  the  con¬ 
struction  of  the  main  line.  The  contraCt  Avas 
signed  July  4,  1853,  and  in  less  than  a  year 
the  road  Avas  completed  and  turned  over  to  the 
lessor  company.  The  firm  Avhich  undertook 
this  contraCt  included,  besides  Mr.  Sheffield, 

44 


Mr.  Farnam,  Mr.  William  Walcott,  and  Mr. 
T.  C.  Durant.  Thus  before  the  first  six  months 
of  1854  had  passed,  a  road  had  been  constructed 
from  Chicago  to  the  Mississippi,  and  a  branch 
had  been  run  as  far  as  Peoria  in  the  central 
part  of  the  State. 

The  completion  of  this  undertaking  was 
justly  regarded  as  of  the  first  importance  to 
the  development,  both  of  the  State  of  Illinois, 
and  of  the  whole  country,  and  was  commem¬ 
orated  by  two  celebrations.  The  first,  which 
was  a  local  affair,  was  conducted  by  the  people 
of  Rock  Island  and  took  the  form  of  an  excur¬ 
sion  over  the  main  line  of  the  road  on  Febru¬ 
ary  22,  1854.  The  guests,  on  arriving  at  Rock 
Island,  were  received  by  the  city  council  and 
entertained  at  a  banquet.  A  number  of  prom¬ 
inent  men,  my  father  among  the  number,  made 
speeches  on  this  occasion,  and  in  the  evening 
there  were  fire-works  and  an  illumination. 
The  following  day  the  guests  returned  to  Chi¬ 
cago. 

The  other  celebration,  which  took  place  in 
June,  was  a  national  affair,  and  was  managed  by 
the  firm  of  Sheffield  and  Farnam  on  a  scale 
proportional  to  the  magnitude  of  their  achieve¬ 
ment.  The  participants,  to  the  number  of 

45 


about  one  thousand,  came  from  all  parts  of 
the  country  and  were  carried  by  the  contractors 
over  the  railroad  from  Chicago  to  Rock  Island 
and  thence  by  steamboat  up  the  Mississippi 
to  Fort  Snelliug  and  back.  Six  large  steamers 
were  barely  equal  to  the  accommodation  of 
the  party,  and  six  days  were  spent  on  the 
excursion. 

The  details  of  both  of  these  celebrations, 
particularly  of  the  second,  which  is  still  re¬ 
membered  with  pleasure  by  many  of  those 
who  had  the  good  fortune  to  take  part  in  it, 
are  interesting,  but  to  give  them  here  would 
fill  a  space  out  of  all  proportion  to  their  im¬ 
portance  in  my  father’s  'career.  A  more  cir¬ 
cumstantial  account  of  them  will  be  found  in 
an  appendix. 

In  those  days  my  father  had  little  time  for 
festivities  of  any  kind.  His  vacations  were 
few,  and  there  was  so  much  work  to  be  done 
that  every  moment  seemed  precious.  Before 
the  Rock  Island  Railroad  had  been  completed, 
he  and  his  associates  had  already  made  their 
plans,  first  for  a  bridge  across  the  Mississippi 
River,  and  then  for  a  railroad  to  run  through 
the  State  of  Iowa  to  the  Missouri.  The  bridge 
was  built  by  an  independent  company,  of  which 

46 


my  father  was  president.  He  also  designed 
the  bridge,  and  superintended  its  construction. 
It  was  finished  in  April,  1855.  The  original 
bridge,  which  was  of  wood  and  ran  across  the 
middle  of  the  island,  has  since  been  replaced 
by  an  iron  structure,  which  crosses  its  lower 
point. 

The  execution  of  these  projects  was  beset 
with  many  difficulties,  with  more,  in  fact,  than 
had  been  met  with  in  the  construction  of  the 
Rock  Island  Railroad.  For  the  bridge,  which 
was  the  first  to  cross  the  Mississippi,  at  once 
provoked  that  conflict  of  interests  which  has 
been  going  on  ever  since.  It  also  necessi¬ 
tated  the  solution  of  some  very  important  legal 
problems.  A  glance  at  a  map  of  the  United 
States  shows  that  most  of  the  large  water¬ 
ways  run  from  North  to  South.  Most  of  the 
trunk  railroads,  however,  follow  the  direction 
of  the  migration  of  population  along  the  par¬ 
allels  of  latitude,  and  run  from  East  to  West. 
The  construction  of  a  bridge  across  the  Missis¬ 
sippi  River  brought  these  two  lines  of  travel 
into  open  conflict,  a  conflict  which  was  aggra¬ 
vated  by  the  faCt  that  they  were  respectively 
championed  by  the  two  foremost  cities  of  the 
West,  whose  commercial  rivalry  has  not  yet 

47 


ceased.  The  people  of  St.  Louis  were  largely 
interested  in  steamboat  navigation,  and  at 
once  complained  that  the  bridge  was  a  great 
hindrance  to  this  traffic.  The  Chicago  people, 
on  the  other  hand,  felt  that  the  growth  of 
their  city  depended  upon  their  being  the 
gate  through  which  all  intercourse  between 
the  western  prairies  and  the  East  must  be 
conducted. 

There  soon  began  a  series  of  persistent  at¬ 
tacks  upon  the  bridge,  made  by  those  who  were 
interested  in  steamboat  navigation.  Steamers 
would  collide  with  the  bridge  and  then  claim 
damages  from  the  company.  In  May,  1856,  a 
boat  ran  into  the  bridge  and  set  fire  to  it,  burn¬ 
ing  away  a  considerable  portion  of  the  trestle 
work,  and  it  was  strongly  suspedled  at  the 
time  that  the  boat,  which  had  already  been 
disabled  by  a  collision  with  a  ferry-boat,  had 
been  run  into  the  bridge  intentionally  in  order 
to  injure  it. 

An  article  published  in  the  Chicago  Times 
of  May  22,  1859,  thus  describes  the  spirit  of 
the  St.  Louis  people : 

‘  ‘  Her  common  council  has  made  large  appropria¬ 
tions,  her  board  of  trade  have  added  to  these,  and  her 
citizens  have  contributed  time  and  money  without 

48 


stint  to  maintain  the  most  vexatious  suits  in  every 
court  jurisdiction  against  one  of  these  railroad  com¬ 
panies  ;  she  has  kept  in  constant  employment  a  corps 
of  engineers  to  survey  and  examine  the  Mississippi 
at  every  point  at  which  bridges  have  been  pro¬ 
posed,  and  she  has  paid  out  liberal  fees  to  the  most 
conspicuous  engineers  of  the  country  for  opinions  ad¬ 
verse  to  these  bridges  in  their  plans,  location,  and  sup¬ 
posed  effect  upon  the  commerce  of  the  river.  Her 
steamboat  owners  and  pilots  have  been  ready  on 
every  occasion  to  furnish  testimony  against  these 
bridges.  The  Rock  Island  Bridge  Company  has  been 
left  to  fight  the  battle  single-handed— -to  fight  the 
battle  against  the  capital,  intellect,  and  party  feeling 
of  her  citizens,  which  have  been  concentrated  upon 
this  single  objedt.” 

To  these  vexatious  and  annoying  difficulties, 
caused  by  the  a&ion  of  the  St.  Louis  people 
and  the  river  pilots,  was  added  a  legal  compli¬ 
cation  of  no  small  magnitude,  for,  while  the 
bridge  was  still  under  construction,  the  United 
States  government  sued  for  an  injunction 
against  it.  The  case  was  argued  in  the  first 
instance  by  the  attorney  -  general  of  the 
United  States  and  Mr.  Hoyne,  district  attor¬ 
ney  for  the  Northern  District  of  Illinois,  for 
the  complainants,  and  by  Mr.  Reverdy  John¬ 
son,  Mr.  Sergeant,  and  Mr.  N.  B.  Judd  for  the 
defendants.  There  were  two  points  made  by 

49 


tlie  United  States  in  its  complaint.  One  was 
that  the  bridge  traversed  land  reserved  by  the 
government  for  military  purposes,  and  that 
the  State  of  Illinois,  therefore,  had  no  right  to 
allow  it  to  be  condemned  by  a  private  corpora¬ 
tion.  The  other  was  that  the  construction  of 
the  bridge  over  the  west  channel  of  the  river 
would  materially  obstruct  steamboat  naviga¬ 
tion.  The  first  complaint,  therefore,  was 
based  upon  the  rights  of  the  United  States  as 
a  proprietor,  and  the  second,  upon  the  power  of 
Congress  to  regulate  inter-state  commerce. 
The  case  was  ably  argued  on  both  sides,  and 
ended  in  1855  in  a  verdiCt  in  favor  of  the 
Bridge  Company.  Thus  the  legal  rights  of 
the  Bridge  Company  were  maintained,  but 
it  required  constant  vigilance  for  many  years 
to  proteCt  it  against  the  attacks  of  its  enemies. 

The  railroad  through  Iowa  was  also  built 
under  great  difficulties.  It  was  first  chartered 
in  February,  1853,  as  the  Mississippi  and  Mis¬ 
souri  Railroad.  It  was  from  the  outset  a  part 
of  the  Rock  Island  system,  and  contraCts  ex¬ 
isted  between  it  and  the  Bridge  Company,  as 
well  as  between  the  Bridge  Company  and  the 
Rock  Island  Railroad,  which  made  all  three 

corporations  but  links  in  one  chain.  The  rail¬ 
s'5 


road  was,  however,  a  separate  corporation,  and 
had  as  such  to  manage  its  own  affairs.  My 
father  was  the  leading  spirit  of  this  enterprise, 
but  unfortunately  he  could  no  longer  command 
the  services  of  Mr.  Sheffield,  who  felt  that  he 
had  arrived  at  a  period  of  life  at  which  he  was 
justified  in  retiring  from  adtive  business, 
though  he  continued  to  aid  the  enterprise  lib¬ 
erally  by  subscribing  to  its  funds.  Mr.  Shef¬ 
field  had  been  an  invaluable  partner.  His  high 
sense  of  honor,  sound  judgment,  and  financial 
skill,  gave  my  father  perfedt  confidence  that 
the  purely  financial  part  of  their  enterprises 
would  be  well  managed,  and  enabled  him  to 
devote  his  undivided  attention  to  the  pradtical 
work  of  construction.  His  partner  in  this  new 
undertaking  was  Mr.  Thomas  C.  Durant,  a 
man  with  whom  he  had  already  been  associated 
in  the  construdtion  of  the  Peoria  and  Bureau 
Valley  Railroad,  but  whose  virtues  were  not 
those  for  which  Mr.  Sheffield  was  conspicuous. 
Other  difficulties,  which  uo  foresight  could  have 
avoided,  showed  themselves  at  an  early  day. 
It  was  expedted,  that  the  counties  through 
which  the  new  road  passed  would  aid  it  by 
issuing  their  bonds  and  subscribing  to  its  stock. 
Two  obstacles,  however,  presented  themselves 


to  this  mode  of  raising  funds.  In  the  first 
place,  there  were  rival  companies,  which  were 
seeking  to  gain  the  support  of  the  people  of 
Iowa,  and  in  the  second  place,  the  people  them¬ 
selves  could  not  command  much  capital.  The 
correspondence  of  Mr.  Hiram  Price,  who  was 
sent  through  the  State  in  1853  as  general  agent 
of  the  railroad  for  the  purpose  of  procuring  the 
right  of  way,  obtaining  subscriptions,  and  do¬ 
ing  any  other  business  that  might  be  necessary 
in  locating  and  establishing  the  line  of  the  road, 
gives  us  a  graphic  picture  of  the  difficulties 
of  the  task. 

In  his  letter  of  September  3d,  he  says  : 

“  At  Kanesville,  found  the  people  wild  for  a  railroad, 
but  partially  committed  in  favor  of  the  Air  Line.  I 
send  you  the  resolutions.  I  spent  two  days  among 
them  ;  conversed  full}'  with  all  their  prominent  men  ; 
held  a  public  meeting  which  was  well  attended. 

They  insist,  and  I  suggest  to  you  the  propriety  of  a 
survey  at  once.  The  Air  Line  has  made  a  survey,  and 
promised  them  to  commence  work  this  fall.  I  am 
satisfied,  that  this  is  all  for  effedt,  but  you  have  no  idea 
of  the  state  of  feeling  through  this  country.  The  other 
companies  promise  them  everything.  ...  It  will 
be  remembered,  that  every  county  between  Iowa  City 
and  Fort  Desmoiues  had  pledged  their  support  to  the 
Lyons,  before  I  started  from  Davenport.” 


52 


On  the  20th  of  August  he  had  reached  Fort 
Desmoines,  from  which  he  writes  : 

“  I  have  called  public  meetings  in  different  places, 
and  succeeded  in  passing  resolutions  leaving  a  county 
subscription  to  be  applied  to  either  road,  as  they  may 
deem  best.  This  is  all  I  could  possibly  accomplish, 
and  considering  the  rabid  feeling  that  exists  along  the 
line  for  the  Lyons  road  and  against  ours,  I  think  this 
is  much.  .  .  .  But  to-night  I  am,  as  you  see,  at 

Fort  Desmoines,  and  a  more  crazy  and  unreasonable 
people  I  have  never  seen  than  a  majority  of  them  are. 
A  few  are  with  us,  but  the  current  sets  strongly,  often 

irresistibly,  the  other  way . The  counties 

between  this  and  Iowa  City  are  not  able  to  take  one- 
third  of  the  stock.  The  whole  taxable  property  of 
Iowa,  Powashiek,  and  Jasper  Counties  is  only  $80,000  ; 
the  distance  by  a  straight  line  through  these  counties 
is  seventy-eight  miles.” 

Iu  a  letter  of  September  20th,  from  Des- 
ruoiues,  he  writes  : 

‘‘The  Polk  County  election  is  over  and  decided,  so 
far  as  that  vote  can  decide,  in  favor  of  the  Lyons  road. 
At  your  distance,  you  no  doubt  think  it  very  strange 
that  men  professing  common  sense  should  adt  so,  but 
you  talk  to  them,  and  you  will  receive  for  an  answer, 

‘  I  signed  the  petition  ;  I  said  I  would  vote  for  it,  before 
I  heard  of  the  Davenport  road  ;  I  believe  the  Lyons 
road,’  and  a  score  of  other  just  such  answers,  some  of 
which  displa}r  not  much  sense,  and  some  of  them  not 
much  honesty.” 

S3 


These  difficulties  were  gradual^  overcome, 
and  in  May,  1855,  the  firm  of  Farnam  and 
Durant  took  the  contrail  for  building  the  Mis¬ 
sissippi  and  Missouri  Railroad  from  Daven¬ 
port  to  Iowa  City,  a  distance  of  fifty-five  miles, 
together  with  a  branch  to  Muscatine,  all  to  be 
finished  and  equipped  by  July  1,  1856.  But 
the  troubles  of  the  company  were  not  yet  ended. 
There  was  a  great  stringency  in  the  money 
market,  and,  as  Mr.  Sheffield  wrote  in  January, 
1856,  it  was  hard  to  get  money,  even  in  New 
York,  on  better  terms  than  fifteen  per  cent,  per 
annum.  Mr.  Durant,  writing  February  28, 
1856,  says : 

“  We  are  paying  one  per  cent,  per  month  and  a  com¬ 
mission  for  money.  I  am  paying  the  same  rather  than 
sell  stock.” 

Difficulty  was  also  experienced  in  finding  a 
market  for  the  securities  of  the  road.  A  letter 
of  December  8,  1855,  from  Mr.  Durant,  states 
that  he  had  offered  Ward  and  Co.,  brokers 
of  New  York,  a  contract  by  which,  if  they  dis¬ 
posed  of  $250,000  worth  of  Mississippi  and 
Missouri  bonds,  in  addition  to  those  taken  by 
Mr.  Sheffield  and  others,  at  $75,  they  would 
realize  a  commission  of  $5,000  and  a  bonus  of 

54 


$25,000  in  the  stock  of  the  company.  Yet  they 
were  not  willing  to  accept  the  offer,  and  Decem¬ 
ber  23,  1855,  he  writes  that,  though  Ward 
and  Co.  had  been  offered  a  commission  of  two 
per  cent.,  instead  of  one  per  cent,  as  at  first, 
they  still  hesitated.  “  It  is  impossible  to  inspire 
people  with  confidence,”  he  writes  January  12, 
1856,  “in  the  enterprise.” 

The  condition  of  the  bank  money  of  the 
country  was  also  a  serious  obstacle.  The  banks 
had  issued  such  a  large  number  of  notes  that  it 
was  often  difficult  to  secure  currency  for  them. 
In  some  cases  the  banks  complained,  that  the 
bank-notes  which  they  had  loaned  had  come 
back  to  them  in  the  original  packages,  and  re¬ 
fused  to  issue  any  more. 

But  a  still  graver  danger  presented  itself. 
My  father’s  partner  had  unfortunately  yielded 
to  the  general  spirit  of  speculation  which  had 
taken  possession  of  so  many  of  the  railroad 
men  of  that  time.  The  result  was  that,  when 
the  commercial  crisis  of  1857  came,  it  brought 
the  firm  of  Farnam  and  Durant  to  the  very 
brink  of  ruin.  So  near  did  the  catastrophe 
seem  that  my  father  actually  wrote,  in  a  letter 
of  August  29,  1857  : 


55 


“  I  thought  a  week  ago  that  I  was  a  rich  man  ;  I 
now  find  the  concern  so  involved  that  we  cannot  possi¬ 
bly  go  on,  and  the  firm  must  make  an  assignment  to¬ 
night  or  Monday.  The  loss  of  property  is  nothing,  if 
I  was  only  sure  that  I  had  enough  for  the  support  of 
my  dear  wife  and  family  ;  to  lose  everything  now  is 
rather  more  than  I  can  bear.” 

And  a  letter  from  Mr.  Walcott,  dated  Sep¬ 
tember  i,  1857,  speaks  of  breaking  the  news  of 
my  father’s  financial  ruin  to  my  mother.  For¬ 
tunately  the  necessity  for  an  assignment  was 
overcome  by  the  prompt  and  vigorous  measures 
taken  by  my  father.  He  was  able  to  avoid 
failure,  and  ultimately  to  extend  the  road  to 
Grinnell,  120  miles  from  Davenport,  though  it 
was  not  carried  through  to  the  Missouri,  until 
after  he  had  retired  from  adlive  business. 

While  all  these  cares  were  weighing  upon 
him,  he  was  adting  as  president  of  the  Chicago 
and  Rock  Island  Railroad,  and  was  also,  for  a 
time,  president  of  the  Merchant’s  Loan  and 
Trust  Company,  a  bank  of  which  he  was  one 
of  the  original  stockholders. 

He  was  also  adtively  interested  in  promoting 
the  plan  for  extending  the  railroad  system 
across  the  continent  to  the  Pacific  coast.  It  is 
interesting  to  notice  that  as  early  as  1856,  Mr. 

56 


Sheffield,  in  one  of  his  letters,  speaks  of  the 
desirability  of  getting  a  charter  for  a  railroad 
from  the  Mississippi  River  to  San  Francisco, 
so  that  this  was  evidently  a  part  of  the  original 
plan  of  the  far-sighted  men  who  finished  the 
Michigan  Southern  road.  When  the  time 
seemed  ripe  for  putting  this  plan  into  execu¬ 
tion,  my  father  became  one  of  the  incorporators 
of  the  Union  Pacific  Company.  Bnt  he  soon 
found  himself  entirely  out  of  sympathy  with 
the  methods  by  which  his  associates  proposed 
to  conduct  the  enterprise,  and  ceased  to  have 
anything  to  do  with  it,  after  the  first  work  of 
incorporation  had  been  accomplished. 

In  addition  to  this  he  began  to  feel  that,  for 
personal  reasons,  it  was  desirable  to  throw  off, 
rather  than  to  assume,  responsibilities.  He 
was  over-worked.  He  was  anxious  about  the 
health  of  his  oldest  son,  whom  a  severe  attack 
of  rheumatism  had  forced  in  December,  1861, 
to  take  the  sea  voyage  to  San  Francisco  by  the 
way  of  Cape  Horn.  He  began  to  feel  that 
what  he  might  add  to  his  means  by  further 
years  of  hard  work  would  be  dearly  bought  at 
the  expense  of  his  health  and  perhaps  of  his 
life.  Yet  it  was  very  hard  to  cut  so  many 
ties  at  once.  In  a  letter  of  April  17,  1862,  to 

57 


his  friend  Hon.  N.  B.  Judd,  who  was  then 
United  States  Minister  at  Berlin,  he  writes, 
after  speaking  of  the  plans  of  the  family : 

“  Mrs.  Farnam  and  myself  will  keep  house  in  Chi¬ 
cago,  and  work  for  the  poor  wounded  and  sick  soldiers. 
You  ask  if  I  work  as  hard  as  ever.  I  never  worked 
as  hard  in  my  life  as  I  have  for  the  last  year,  and  I 
have  of  late  been  thinking  how  I  could  get  out  of  it. 
If  I  had  not  everything  I  am  worth  tied  up  in  this 
railroad,  I  would  cut  loose  at  once,  and  go  to  Europe, 
and  meet  George  B.  on  his  way  home.  But  to  go 
away  now  .  .  .  would  be  equivalent  to  throwing 

away  everything.  Still  it  would  not  be  the  most  sur¬ 
prising  thing  that  ever  happened,  if  I  should  get  mad 
some  day,  and  jump  from  the  train,  even  at  some  risk 
of  injury,  and  run  off  to  Europe,  though  I  can  hardly 
see  my  way  clear  just  now.” 

In  tlie  following  year,  however,  he  took  the 
salto  mortale.  He  was  now  in  his  sixtieth 
year.  He  had  been  at  work  continuously  since 
the  age  of  sixteen,  and  felt  the  need  of  repose. 
He  was  also  anxious  to  see  again  my  oldest 
brother,  who  had  by  this  time  reached  Europe 
from  the  East  on  his  journey  around  the  world. 
He  was  deeply  interested  in  the  war,  but  he 
felt  that  at  his  age  he  could  do  more  by  his 
financial  support  than  by  any  form  of  personal 
service,  and  he  could  not  remain  in  this  country, 

58 


without  becoming  constantly  involved  in  all 
kinds  of  labors  and  responsibilities. 

Everything  pointed  to  a  trip  abroad  as  the 
one  thing  needed.  On  June  4  he  resigned  the 
presidency  of  the  Rock  Island  Railroad,  and 
on  August  5,  1863,  he  embarked  from  Boston 
on  the  old  Cuuard  steamer  Africa. 


59 


IV. 


RETIREMENT 


1863-1883 


OF  the  remaining  twenty  years  of  my 
father’s  life,  five  were  spent  mainly  in 
travel  abroad,  and  fifteen,  in  his  home  in  New 
Haven.  He  took  with  him  on  the  Africa 
my  mother  and  his  three  youngest  children. 
My  brother  George  met  us  on  the  dock  at 
Liverpool.  Leaving  my  sister  and  myself  to 
pursue  our  studies  at  Fontainebleau,  the  rest 
of  the  party  traveled  during  the  winter  of 
1863-4  in  Egypt  and  the  Holy  Land.  They 
ascended  the  Nile  in  a  dahabeah  as  far  as  the 
second  cataradl,  and  returned  to  Europe  by  the 
way  of  Syria  and  Constantinople. 

Iu  the  autumn  of  1864  my  father  came  home 
in  order  to  vote  for  President  Lincoln  ;  but  in 
the  summer  of  1865  he  returned  to  Europe,  and 

60 


remained  there  three  years,  making  Paris  his 
headquarters,  but  traveling  from  time  to  time 
in  various  parts  of  Europe,  and  visiting  Nor¬ 
way,  Germany,  Spain,  Russia,  Italy,  Switzer¬ 
land,  and  the  British  Isles.  My  mother  was 
with  him  during  the  entire  period,  my  brother 
George,  most  of  the  time  until  1867.  My 
sister  was  at  school  in  Fontainebleau  until 
1867,  when  she  joined  my  parents  on  some  of 
their  excursions.  In  the  summer  of  1865,  my 
father  enjoyed  the  pleasure  of  a  re-union  of  all 
his  family  at  Paris,  the  first  gathering  of  the 
kind  which  had  taken  place  since  1861. 

In  1868  he  returned  to  the  United  States, 
and  decided,  largely  on  the  advice  of  my  brother 
George,  to  take  up  his  residence  again  in  New 
Haven,  the  city  in  which  he  had  passed  so 
many  years  of  abtive  life,  and  in  which  all  of 
his  children  had  been  born.  Many  years  be¬ 
fore,  he  had  bought  a  piece  of  ground  on 
Whitney  avenue,  to  which  he  had  subsequently 
added  a  lot  on  Hillhouse  avenue.  On  the 
latter  site,  he  built  the  home  of  his  declining 
years,  which  was  finished  in  1871  and  which 
he  occupied  at  the  time  of  his  death.  Before 
the  end  of  the  year  1873,  four  of  his  children 
had  married,  and  all  of  them  sooner  or  later 

61 


made  New  Haven  their  home.  The  remainder 
of  his  life  was  spent  quietly  and  peacefully  in 
the  management  of  his  property,  in  adts  of 
public  beneficence,  and  in  the  enjoyment  of 
his  children  and  grand-children.  He  made 
few  j  ourney s  during  this  period.  In  February, 
1877,  however,  he  and  my  mother  took  his  son 
George  to  Europe,  in  order  that  he  might  use 
the  waters  of  Aix-les-Bains,  which  had  greatly 
benefited  him  several  years  before,  but  which 
seemed  now,  unfortunately,  to  have  lost  their 
efficac}^.  In  the  autumn  of  the  same  year,  they 
accompanied  him  and  his  family  to  Nassau  in 
the  Bahama  Islands,  and  spent  the  winter  there 
with  him. 

Many  quiet  pleasures  filled  up  these  last 
years  of  his  life.  At  short  distances  from  his 
own  home  lived  all  of  his  children,  who  made 
him  daily  visits,  and  were  in  the  habit  of  tak¬ 
ing  tea  in  his  house  every  Sunday  evening. 
He  enjoyed  to  the  full  these  family  gatherings, 
and  joined  with  great  pleasure  in  the  singing 
of  hymns  which  usually  occupied  the  early 
part  of  the  evening.  Several  of  the  neighbors, 
particularly  President  Porter,  Professor  Fisher 
and  Professor  Silliman,  were  to  be  found  in  his 
library  almost  as  regularly  Sunday  evenings 

62 


as  his  own  children,  and  the  time  passed  pleas¬ 
antly  with  stories,  anecdotes,  and  the  discus¬ 
sion  of  the  events  of  the  day.  Not  infrequently 
some  of  his  friends  from  other  cities  would 
visit  him,  and  talk  over  old  times,  and  thus  he 
maintained  an  ever  fresh  interest  in  the  past 
and  in  the  present,  in  friends  near  at  hand  and 
in  friends  far  away.  He  was  very  fond  of  driv¬ 
ing,  and  explored  the  beautiful  roads  about 
New  Haven  in  every  direction.  He  generally 
managed  to  so  arrange  his  route  that,  either 
going  or  coming,  he  could  pass  the  house  of 
one  of  his  children,  and  have  a  little  chat  with 
the  grand-children,  who  were  always  glad  to 
see  his  smiling  face. 

One  of  the  chief  pleasures  of  his  life  had 
always  been  to  do  good  to  others.  This  was 
so  natural  and  so  thoroughly  a  part  of  him¬ 
self  that  it  seems  needless,  and  in  truth  it 
would  be  impossible,  to  mention  in  detail  his 
adls  of  kindness  and  generosity.  What  he 
gave  was  always  given  unostentatiously,  and 
without  any  desire  for  notoriety.  In  some 
cases,  however,  his  name  became  permanently 
connected  with  the  gifts.  As  early  as  1863,  he 
gave  $30,000  to  Yale  College,  to  be  expended 
in  the  eredlion  of  a  new  dormitory.  At  a 


later  period,  he  added  another  $30,000,  and  the 
building  which  this  money  made  it  possible  to 
ereCt  in  1870,  and  which  was  the  first  struc¬ 
ture  of  the  new  quadrangle,  was  called  by  the 
corporation  after  his  name.  He  frequently 
gave  smaller  sums  to  the  different  depart¬ 
ments  of  Yale  College,  particularly  the  Art 
School,  the  Library,  and  the  Divinity  School. 
His  gift  of  the  “  Farnam  Drive  ”  to  East 
Rock  Park  connected  his  name  with  a  feature 
of  the  city  in  which  all  the  people  of  New 
Haven  take  a  just  pride.  The  hospital,  too, 
interested  him  constantly,  and  in  addition  to 
numerous  other  gifts,  he  endowed  one  of  its 
free  beds.  The  representatives  of  minor 
charities  and  public  institutions  were  fre¬ 
quently  seen  in  his  house,  and  seldom  went 
away  without  some  substantial  expression  of 
his  good-will. 

His  health  was  always  robust.  Even  when 
worn  out  with  overwork,  he  was  not  subject 
to  any  acute  disease,  and  illness  was  some¬ 
thing  of  which  he  had  no  experience  from 
the  time  of  his  recovery  from  the  malarial 
fever  contracted  in  the  Tonawanda  Swamp 
until  the  last  few  years  of  his  life.  In  1875, 
however,  he  found  himself  failing  in  strength, 


and  though  the  physicians  were  at  first  uncer¬ 
tain  as  to  the  nature  of  the  ailment,  it  was 
finally  found  to  be  diabetes.  Thanks  to  his 
strong  constitution,  and  to  the  judicious  treat¬ 
ment  of  Dr.  William  H.  Draper,  he  was  able 
to  recover  from  this  disease,  and  again  to 
enjoy  the  good  health  to  which  he  had  always 
been  accustomed.  The  stroke  of  paralysis 
which  ended  his  life  came  without  warning 
on  Saturday  evening,  the  30th  of  September, 
1883,  and  he  died  peacefully,  and  apparently 
without  pain,  on  the  morning  of  the  4th  of 
O&ober. 

This  imperfedt  narrative  of  what  my  father 
did  gives  us  but  a  dim  conception  of  what  he 
was.  His  character  was  marked  by  a  singular 
consistency.  He  was  always  the  same.  He 
did  not  have  one  standard  of  condudt  for  the 
counting-room  and  another  for  the  home.  He 
did  not  stoop  to  practices  in  public  life  which 
he  would  have  scorned  in  his  relations  towards 
his  friends.  He  was  always  straightforward, 
open,  true. 

His  charadler  was,  however,  a  broad  one,  and 
contained  elements  that  are  not  always  found 
in  harmonious  co-operation.  Thus  his  innate 
kindness  was  not  inconsistent  with  great 


strength  of  will.  Indulgent  as  he  was  towards 
the  faults  of  others,  and  much  as  he  shrank 
from  giving  pain  to  any  one,  he  did  not  allow 
his  feelings  to  stand  in  the  way  of  his  duty,  and 
when  he  had  made  up  his  mind  to  say  No,  was 
immovable. 

A  letter,  which  happens  to  have  been  pre¬ 
served  among  his  papers,  is  so  characteristic  of 
this  trait  that  it  deserves  to  be  here  reproduced. 
It  is  addressed  to  one  of  the  employes  of  the 
Chicago  and  Rock  Island  Railroad.  After 
stating  that  the  individual  addressed  had  often 
promised  to  abstain  from  intoxicating  liquors, 
but  still  persisted  in  drinking,  the  letter  con¬ 
tinues  : 

“You  are  aware  that  I  have  done  all  in  my  power 
to  reform  you  and  make  you  useful  to  us  and  an  orna¬ 
ment  to  }7our  profession,  but  I  am  satisfied  that  your 
reformation  is  hopeless.  You  are  therefore  notified 
that  your  services  are  no  longer  wanted.” 

Even  in  this  case,  however,  he  did  not  want 
to  inflidt  any  unnecessary  pain,  and  held  back 
the  letter  for  some  time  after  it  was  written, 
because  the  man  to  whom  it  was  addressed 
was  sick. 

In  all  respeCIs  his  nature  was  singularly 

well  balanced.  Thus,  while  setting  up  the 

66 


highest  standard  of  conduct  for  himself,  he 
was  charitable  towards  the  shortcomings  of 
others,  and  wdiile  generous  and  open-handed, 
he  was  never  wasteful  or  extravagant.  Busy 
as  he  was  during  the  greater  part  of  his  life, 
he  never  allowed  himself  to  become  a  slave  to 
his  profession,  and  always  took  pleasure  in 
music,  art,  the  drama,  and  nature. 

In  society  he  was  full  of  pleasant  talk.  His 
fund  of  anecdote  was  large,  and  his  accurate 
memory,  his  knowledge  of  men,  his  shrewd 
observation,  and  his  keen  but  never  caustic 
humor,  made  his  conversation  enjoyable. 

His  manners  were  marked  by  a  courtesy 
which  knew  no  distinctions.  To  his  inferiors 
he  was  never  condescending,  to  his  equals, 
never  obsequious.  His  bearing  was  marked 
by  a  natural  dignity  and  a  genuine  self-respedt, 
as  far  removed  from  self-assertion,  on  the  one 
hand,  as  from  an  affedted  modesty,  on  the  other. 
Accustomed  to  treat  others  with  consideration, 
he  never  feared  that  he  himself  would  be 
treated  otherwise. 

Of  an  even,  well-controlled  temper,  he  was 
neither  soured  by  failure  nor  puffed  up  by  suc¬ 
cess.  He  preserved  throughout  his  life  an 
almost  child-like  simplicity  of  thought  and 

67 


sentiment,  and  the  manner  of  his  death  seemed 
in  perfect  harmony  with  a  character  which, 
throug'h  the  trials  and  temptations  of  the 
w'orld,  kept  the  heart  pure  and  the  mind 
serene,  and  the  memory  of  which  is  cherished 
by  all  who  knew  him  as  at  once  an  inspiration 
and  a  benediction. 


68 


APPENDIX. 


AN  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  FESTIVITIES  BY  WHICH  THE 
COMPLETION  OF  THE  CHICAGO  AND  ROCK 

island  railroad  was  celebrated. 

The  completion  of  the  first  railroad  to  the 
Mississippi  in  1854  was  commemorated  by  two 
celebrations.  The  first  was  held  in  Rock 
Island  immediately  after  the  opening  of  the 
road ;  the  second  was  held  four  months  later, 
and  took  the  form  of  a  great  excursion  from 
Chicago  to  St.  Paul. 

An  outline  of  the  former  is  contained  in  the 
following  handbill,  printed  at  'the  time : 


ORDER  OF  THE  DAY. 

RAILROAD  FESTIVAL, 

February  22 ,  1854. 

The  First  Train  of  Cars  from  Chicago 

will  arrive  at  Rock  Island  at  5  o’clock  p.  m.,  which 

event  will  be  heralded  by  the  roar  of  artillery,  the 
69 


sounds  of  joyful  music,  and  the  acclamations  of  the 
people. 

At  half-past  four  p.  m.,  the  President  of  the  Day, 
with  the  Committee  of  Reception,  will  be  at  the  depot, 
to  welcome  the  guests  whom  the  city  authorities  have 
invited  to  the  celebration. 

At  a  quarter  before  five,  the  guests  from  the  State  of 
Iowa  are  requested  to  assemble  at  the  Rock  Island 
House,  and  march  to  the  depot,  conducted  by  Messrs. 
William  Bell  and  E.  C.  Cropper. 

On  the  arrival  of  the  cars,  the  guests  will  be  received 
into  the  depot  by  Messrs.  M.  B.  Osborn  and  A.  K. 
Philleo. 

Seats  at  the  table  will  be  indicated  to  each  one  of 
the  guests  by  Messrs.  Bailey,  Buttrick,  Stoddard,  Van- 
sant,  and  Bolmer. 

As  soon  as  the  guests  from  the  cars  are  within  the 
depot,  the  citizens  of  Rock  Island  will  be  conducted 
in  by  Mr.  I.  Negus  and  Dr.  Brackett,  in  the  following 
order  : 

FIRST — THE  CITY  COUNCIL. 

SECOND — THE  REVEREND  CLERGY. 

THIRD — CITIZENS. 

When  the  seats  are  all  occupied,  the  music,  the 
firing,  and  the  shouting  will  cease.  The  President  of 
the  Day  will  call  on  all  to  rise,  when 

J.  J.  BEARDSLEY,  ESQ., 

who  has  been  appointed  to  that  office,  will,  in  behalf 
of  the  City  of  Rock  Island,  pronounce  the 
WELCOME. 

70 


Seats  will  then  be  resumed  at  the  dinner  table  ;  after 
the  enjoyment  of  which,  the 

REGULAR  TOASTS 

will  be  read  by  the  President ;  responses  to  which  are 
expected  from  the  guests. 

After  the  Regular  Toasts,  Volunteer  Toasts,  Senti¬ 
ments,  and  Speeches  will  be  in  order. 

At  the  close  of  the  festivities,  the  guests  will  form 
a  procession  and  march,  with  music,  down  Illinois 
street  to  the  Court  House  Square  to  witness  the  illu¬ 
mination,  and  return  to  the  Rock  Island  House. 

Before  leaving  the  depot,  each  guest,  by  calling  at 
the  office  at  the  west  end,  will  be  furnished  with  a 
ticket  for  lodgings  by  Mr.  A.  K.  Philleo. 

Coaches  will  be  in  readiness  to  carry  the  guests  to 
their  lodgings,  and  to  the  cars  on  the  following  morn¬ 
ing. 

After  the  President  of  the  Day  leaves  the  depot, 
Mr.  Bailey  will  preside  ;  and  the  depot  will  be  kept 
open  for  the  citizens  as  long  as  any  of  them  may  de¬ 
sire. 

N.  B.  BUFORD, 
Preside7it  of  the  Day. 

The  temporary  building  in  which  the  guests 
were  entertained  at  dinner  was  constructed,  it 
is  stated,  in  less  than  three  days,  and  was  one 
hundred  feet  long  and  twenty  feet  wide. 

The  reception  speech  was  made  by  J.  J. 
Beardsley,  of  Rock  Island.  The  dinner  was 


presided  over  by  Colonel  Buford,  and  among 
the  toasts  responded  to  were  the  following : 

“  The  2 2d  of  February ,  1854. ,  the  espousal  day  of 
the  Mississippi  River  and  the  Atlantic  Ocean.  May 
no  vandal  hands  ever  break  the  connection.” 

‘ 1  The  projectors  of  the  C.  &  R.  I.  Railroad.  Their 
hearts  rejoice  in  what  their  eyes  behold.  What  was 
conceived  in  weakness  is  this  day  brought  forth  in 
strength.” 

‘‘  Messrs.  Famam  and  Sheffield ,  the  builders  of  the 
C.  &  R.  I.  Railroad.  They  have  demonstrated  by 
their  fidelity  and  enterprise  that  a  corporation  may 
have  a  soul.  In  their  march  to  the  Pacific,  the  bless¬ 
ings  of  cities  and  States  left  behind  will  follow  them.” 

1  ‘  The  President  of  the  Day.  The  mantle  of  his  an¬ 
cestors’  liberality  and  regard  for  the  public  weal  has 
fallen  upon  him,  and  he  does  honor  to  its  wearing. 
At  the  nuptial  feast  of  the  proud  Mississippi  to  the 
giant  Atlantic,  he  sheds  additional  luster  on  the  occa¬ 
sion  in  giving  away  the  bride.” 

In  response  to  the  toast  in  honor  of  Messrs. 
Sheffield  and  Farnam,  Mr.  Farnam  spoke  some¬ 
what  reludlantly  as  follows : 

‘  ‘  As  I  have  long  since  given  you  notice  that  a  speech 
was  not  included  in  my  contract,  you  will  not  expedt 
at  this  short  notice  a  speech  of  any  kind  from  me.  I 

72 


did  not  come  here  to  make  a  speech,  but  to  join  in 
your  festivities,  and  to  rejoice  with  you  upon  the  com¬ 
pletion  of  this  work.  Let  us  compare  the  past  with 
the  present.  It  is  less  than  one-quarter  of  a  century, 
and  within  the  recollection  of  the  most  of  you,  that  the 
first  locomotive  made  its  appearance  in  the  States. 
Now,  more  than  fourteen  thousand  miles  of  iron  rails 
are  traversed  by  the  iron  horse  with  almost  lightning- 
speed.  It  is  less  than  two  years  since  the  first  train 
of  cars  entered  the  State  of  Illinois  from  the  Bast,  then 
connecting  Bake  Brie  with  Chicago.  It  is  less  than 
one  year  since  the  first  continuous  line  of  road  was 
completed  connecting  New  York  with  Chicago.  Now, 
there  are  two  distinct  lines  the  entire  distance  connect¬ 
ing  Chicago  and  the  great  prairies  of  the  West  with 
New  York  and  Boston.  Two  years  ago,  there  was  less 
than  one  hundred  miles  of  road  in  operation  in  the 
State  of  Illinois,  and  most  of  that  was  what  is  called 
the  ‘strap  rail.’  Now,  more  than  twelve  hundred 
miles  of  road  of  the  most  substantial  character  is  in 
operation,  eight  hundred  of  which  leads  direCtly  to  the 
city  of  Chicago. 

To-day,  we  witness  the  nuptials  of  the  Atlantic  with 
the  Bather  of  Waters.  To-morrow,  the  people  of  Rock 
Island  can  go  to  New  York  the  entire  distance  by  rail¬ 
road,  and  within  the  space  of  forty-two  hours. 

Gentlemen,  I  thank  you  for  the  compliment  con¬ 
tained  in  the  sentiment  just  offered,  and  while  I  am 
proud  of  the  compliment,  I  am  not  so  vain  or  so  selfish 
as  to  take  the  credit  all  to  myself,  and  while  I  am 
greatly  indebted  to  the  citizens  generally  of  Illinois,  I 


73 


should  do  myself  great  injustice,  if  I  were  to  omit 
mentioning  the  names  of  those  who  have  more  imme¬ 
diately  aided  me  in  carrying  forward  this  great  work. 
It  does  not  become  me  to  speak  of  the  officers  of  the 
company  ;  their  works  are  matters  of  history.  Too 
much  praise  cannot  be  bestowed  upon  them  for  their 
energy  and  perseverance  in  prosecuting  this  work  to 
completion,  but  I  shall  be  excused  for  mentioning  the 
names  of  those  under  whose  judicious  and  skillful 
management  the  labor  has  been  executed. 

Allow  me  to  head  the  list  with  your  own  excellent 
Governor  Matteson  ;  and  then  come  Gardner  and 
Goss,  Crotty,  Warner  and  Sherwin,  Clark  and  Mann, 
Killedea,  Whitman  and  Boyle,  Armour,  Groendike, 
Carmichael,  Holmes,  and  others,  whose  names  I  can¬ 
not  now  mention. 

The  beautiful  and  substantial  bridges  over  which 
we  have  this  day  passed  were  built  by  John  Warner 
and  Co.  and  Stone  and  Boomer. 

I  will  detain  you  with  details  no  longer.  I  again 
thank  you  for  the  kindness  shown  me  on  this  occasion, 
and  I  will  ask  to  propose  a  sentiment — ‘  The  Citize?is 
of  Rock  !s/and.  May  they  ever  cherish  the  bond 
which  this  day  binds  them  to  the  Atlantic  cities.’  ” 

The  toasts  were  thirteen  in  all,  and  after  the 
regular  exercises  were  over,  those  who  re¬ 
mained  continued  the  entertainment  by  offer¬ 
ing  additional  toasts,  among  which  was  the 
following,  proposed  by  E.  T.  Bridges  : 


74 


“  Henry  Farnam,  the  embodiment  of  the  age.  We 
honor  him  not  less  for  his  indomitable  perseverance 
and  untiring  energy  than  for  his  enlarged  liberality 
and  courteous  bearing.” 

It  was  remarked  that  (in  the  language  of 
one  of  the  reporters)  alcohol  was  not  suffered 
to  poison  the  union  that  was  then  effected  be¬ 
tween  the  waters  of  the  Mississippi  River  and 
Lake  Michigan.  No  substitutes  for  either 
were  provided  except  simple  tea  and  coffee, 
and  consequently  among  the  sentiments  was 
one  proposed  by  D.  N.  Burnhan,  of  Chicago  : 

“ The  temperance  aspect  of  this  elegant  festival.  May 
your  worthy  example  be  followed  all  the  country 
throughout.” 

After  the  dinner,  the  guests  were  provided 
with  accommodations  by  the  citizens,  and  in 
the  evening  Rock  Island  and  Davenport  were 
illuminated.  The  following  day,  the  whole 
party  returned  to  Chicago,  making  the  trip  in 
seven  hours  and  thirty  minutes. 

This  celebration  in  Rock  Island  was  infor¬ 
mal  and  mainly  confined  to  the  people  of  the 
locality.  The  partners  who  constructed  the 
road  were,  however,  eastern  men,  and  were 
fully  aware  of  the  general  ignorance  that  pre¬ 
vailed  in  the  Bast  with  regard  to  the  West. 

75 


They,  therefore,  conceived  the  idea  of  inviting 
some  of  their  eastern  friends  to  an  excursion, 
and  of  taking  them,  not  only  over  the  line  of 
the  new  road,  but  also  up  the  Mississippi 
River  to  St.  Paul,  in  order  that  they  might 
see  with  their  own  eyes  the  resources  of  the 
New  West.  It  was  originally  not  intended  to 
make  the  excursion  a  large  one,  but  as  soon 
as  the  plan  became  known,  requests  for  invita¬ 
tions  poured  in  in  such  numbers  that,  what  was 
expedled  to  be  a  small  party  of  friends,  grew 
into  a  throng  which  crowded  six  Mississippi 
steamboats. 

The  excursion  was  carried  out  in  a  charac¬ 
teristically  liberal  spirit,  and  many  professions 
and  many  cities  were  represented  in  it. 

Among  the  representatives  of  the  press  were 
Thurlow  Weed,  at  that  time  of  the  Albany 
Journal ;  Col.  Fuller,  of  the  Mirror ;  Epes 
Sargent,  formerly  of  the  Boston  Transcript ; 
Samuel  Bowles,  of  the  Springfield  Republican  ; 
J.  H.  Sanford  and  W.  C.  Prime,  of  the  New 
York  Journal  of  Commerce ;  N.  W.  T.  Root, 
of  the  New  Haven  Register ;  Chas.  A.  Dana, 
at  that  time  of  the  New  York  Tribune;  James 
M.  Woodward,  of  the  New  Haven  Courier ,  and 
James  F.  Babcock,  of  the  New  Haven  Pal  la- 


dium.  Among  the  other  guests  were  Presi¬ 
dent  Fillmore,  of  Buffalo,  Governor  Baldwin, 
Professors  Fitch  and  Twining,  the  Misses 
Gerry,  Professor  Benjamin  Silliman,  Prof, 
and  Mrs.  Earned,  Judge  Boardman,  James 
Brewster,  Dr.  Leonard  Bacon,  and  Ezra  C. 
Reed,  of  New  Haven,  Judge  McCurdy  and 
daughter  (now  Mrs.  Prof.  Salisbury),  of  Lyme, 
and  many  others,  in  all  about  a  thousand  gen¬ 
tlemen  and  ladies. 

At  that  time  the  West  was  so  little  known 
to  the  East  that  the  newspaper  correspondents 
who  attended  the  excursion  found  it  interest¬ 
ing  to  their  readers  to  describe  all  the  towns 
of  importance  that  they  went  through.  Of 
Cleveland  Mr.  Babcock  says  in  his  letter  of 
June  ist : 

“  Tt  has  some  resemblance  to  New  Haven,  and  in 
its  general  plan  is  equal  to  it,  or  would  be,  if  its  public 
greens  approached  ours  in  size  and  beauty.  Its  streets 
are  magnificent  and  well  ornamented  with  trees,  and 
there  is  much  taste  displayed  here.  The  stores  are 
very  spacious  and  rather  elegant  ;  but  Cleveland  needs 
the  completion  and  perfection  in  detail,  the  finishing 
off  and  sweeping  up  of  some  of  the  older  cities  of  New 
England,  especially  New  Haven.  These  slight  im¬ 
perfections  are,  however,  to  be  expeded  in  all  new 
towns  and  cities.  The  wonder  is  that  there  has  been 


77 


so  much  time  and  disposition  here  for  the  cultivation 
of  a  taste  for  the  beautiful,  as  evinced  by  the  results 
seen  in  all  diredtions.  The  public  edifices  and  private 
dwellings  of  the  better  sort  are  generally  very  credita¬ 
ble  to  the  place,  although  generally  wanting  in  the 
admirable  proportions  and  exquisite  finish  of  the  archi¬ 
tecture  of  New  Haven,  which  in  this  respedt  excels 
any  other  place  I  ever  saw,  of  course  excepting  seledt 
localities  in  some  of  the  larger  Eastern  cities.  The 
two  New  Haven  architedts  would  be  able  to  make  im¬ 
portant  improvements  in  some  of  the  most  costly 
buildings  here.” 

Toledo  was  described,  in  a  letter  of  June  3d, 
as  containing  a  population  of  about  ten  thou¬ 
sand,  “  nearly  half  of  whom  have  accumulated 
within  two  years.”  But  the  author  continues, 
“  Like  all  the  new  and  thriving  western  towns 
it  is  unfinished.” 

Chicago,  however,  was  the  city  which  natu¬ 
rally  excited  the  greatest  amount  of  enthusi¬ 
asm  and  comment.  Mr.  Babcock  says,  in  his 
letter  of  June  5th  : 

‘‘It  is  wonderful  for  its  capacities  and  resources, 
but  more  wonderful  for  its  rapid  growth.  Four  years 
ago,  it  was  a  mere  village,  and  now  it  is  a  city  of  about 
seventy  thousand  inhabitants,  and  having  all  the  signs 
of  a  proportionate  increase  during  the  next  ten  jyears. 

.  The  streets  are  generally  planked,  and  as  far 

as  the  ej'e  can  reach  they  present  a  smooth  surface, 

78 


without  a  hole  or  hillock.  The  walks  are  about  fifteen 
feet  wide  and  neatly  planked.  Timber,  you  know,  is 
here  much  cheaper  than  brick,  and  quite  as  good  for 
temporal  use.  .  .  .  The  oldest  native  inhabitant 

of  this  place  is  a  young  lady  twenty-two  years  of  age. 
She  is  a  daughter  of  Col.  R.  J.  Hamilton,  and  was 
born  in  Fort  Dearborn. 

In  1818  there  were  but  two  white  families  here. 
What  a  change  has  been  wrought  here  since  that 
short  period  ! 

Among  the  relics  of  the  past  is  still  preserved,  on 
the  government  reservation,  the  old  blockhouse  used 
as  a  fortification  against  the  hostile  Indians.  It  is 
about  twenty  feet  square,  built  of  hewn  logs,  with 
a  square  doorway  about  three  feet  in  dimensions. 
Twelve  or  fourteen  feet  from  the  ground,  the  logs  pro¬ 
ject  over  the  main  building,  so  that  it  was  almost  im¬ 
possible  for  an  Indian  to  climb  to  the  roof  without  the 
aid  of  ladders.  In  the  projecting  story  are  small 
openings  for  directing  the  aim  of  muskets  upon  the 
besiegers.  This  was  the  first  fortification  of  the  kind 
I  had  ever  seen,  and  I  was,  of  course,  much  interested 
with  it.  A  few  rods  from  it  is  the  old  lighthouse, 
now  far  inland,  for  large  warehouses  are  built  between 
it  and  the  lake.  The  Chicago  River,  a  narrow  stream, 
but  deep  enough  to  float  the  largest  steamers,  runs 
close  by  the  lighthouse  and  through  the  center  of  the 
city.  The  river  is  crossed  here  by  a  small  ferry-boat, 
worked  by  hand,  or  pulled  by  the  aid  of  a  rope  fast¬ 
ened  to  each  bank.  When  vessels  pass,  this  rope  is 
dropped  well  down  into  the  water.  The  ferry  is  free 


79 


to  all  who  use  it.  A  few  rods  above  is  a  swinging 
bridge,  which  is  thrown  open  for  vessels  every  few 
minutes  during  the  day,  and  long  lines  of  vehicles 
often  stand  in  the  streets  on  either  side  of  the  river, 
waiting  for  the  use  of  the  bridge.  Tp  avoid  these 
annoyances,  it  is  now  seriously  proposed  to  tunnel  the 
river’s  bed.” 

Those  who  know  the  Chicago  of  to-day  will 
be  amused  at  the  comparatively  simple  appear¬ 
ance  of  the  great  metropolis  of  the  West  thirty 
years  ago ;  and  yet,  even  at  that  time,  it  was 
considered  to  be  a  marvel,  and  the  features 
which  seem  to  us  to  prove  its  primitiveness 
are  precisely  the  ones  which  Mr.  Babcock 
picks  out  to  show  its  progress. 

The  guests  assembled  in  Chicago,  and  started 
from  there  on  the  morning  of  Monday,  June 
5th,  for  Rock  Island  over  the  newly-finished 
Chicago  and  Rock  Island  Railroad.  There 
were  two  trains  of  nine  cars  each,  filled  with 
people,  which  moved  out  of  the  depot  in  the 
presence  of  a  large  crowd  of  spectators. 

Rock  Island  was  reached  at  four  o’clock  in 
the  afternoon,  and  the  passengers  at  once  em¬ 
barked  on  board  six  steamboats,  which  had 
been  engaged  for  the  trip.  The  names  of  the 
boats  were  the  JVar  Eagle ,  the  Galena ,  the 

80 


Lady  Franklin,  the  Sparhawk,  the  Golden 
Era ,  and  the  Jenny  Lind.  Each  boat  was 
provided  with  a  band,  and  as  the  little  fleet  of 
steamers  started  np  the  Mississippi  River,  the 
music  on  their  decks  was  answered  by  the 
cheers  of  the  people  on  shore,  and  bon-fires 
and  fire-works  illuminated  their  course.  Rock 
Island  at  that  day  contained  about  4,500  in¬ 
habitants,  while  Davenport  contained  7,000. 
On  June  8th  the  steamboats  reached  St.  Paul, 
which  was  then  the  seat  of  the  territorial  gov¬ 
ernment  of  Minnesota,  and  contained  about 
5,000  inhabitants.  The  city  itself  was  then 
about  six  years  old. 

St.  Paul  was  reached  somewhat  sooner  than 
the  people  there  had  expedted,  so  that  their 
preparations  for  the  reception  of  the  excur¬ 
sionists  had  not  been  fully  made.  Conse¬ 
quently  there  was  some  confusion.  Mr. 
Babcock  graphically  describes  the  scene  on 
lauding : 

“  All  is  bustle,”  he  says,  “  and  confusion  on  shore, 
and  all  sorts  of  vehicles  are  coming  down  the  bank. 
There  sit  Governor  Baldwin  and  Mrs.  B.  in  high 
backed  chairs  in  a  long  lumber  wagon,  in  company 
with  a  dozen  more  on  similar  seats.  There,  in  just 
such  a  wagon,  sit  Mr.  McCurdy  and  daughter,  sur- 

81 


rounded  by  other  ladies  and  gentlemen.  There  are 
Judge  J.  O.  Phelps,  C.  B.  Lines,  and  Mr.  Woodward, 
of  the  Journal,  in  a  very  handsome  one-horse  buggy. 
They  have  not  waited  for  the  uncertain  movements  of 
the  committee,  but  have  been  to  a  stable  and  provided 
for  themselves.  There  is  James  Brewster  and  wife 
in  another  similar  carriage.  There  is  the  Rev.  Dr. 
Bacon,  Rev.  Mr.  Eggleston,  Rev.  Dr.  Fitch,  and 
others,  in  a  lumber  wagon.  .  .  .  It  is  now  time  to 

enquire,  as  did  Daniel  Webster  on  an  important  occa¬ 
sion,  Where  shall  I  go  ?  .  .  .  A  St.  Paul  man 

told  us  to  get  a  seat  where  we  could  !  .  .  .  Here 

is  room,  said  Prof.  Twining,  come  up  here.  We  were 
soon  on  the  vehicle,  and  took  position  between  Gov¬ 
ernor  Berrie,  of  Michigan,  and  Mr.  Twining.  On  the 
seat  below  was  Mr.  Bancroft,  the  historian,  his  son, 
and  the  driver  of  the  carriage,  and  back  of  all  was 
stretched  out  one  of  the  editors  of  the  New  York 
Times.  ’  ’ 

A  slight  mishap  occurred  here  to  Mr.  Ban¬ 
croft,  the  historian,  which  might  have  proved 
a  serious  accident,  for  he  lost  his  balance  on 
the  top  of  the  coach,  and  fell  to  the  ground, 
and  for  a  time  was  in  great  danger  of  being 
run  over  by  the  wheels  ;  but  he  was  rescued 
in  time,  and  remounted  without  injury. 

St.  Paul  was  at  that  time  a  city  of  few  at¬ 
tractions  in  itself,  but  it  boasted  of  one  great 
sight,  the  Falls  of  St.  Anthony,  nine  miles 

82 


distant.  Accordingly  the  party  were  taken 
there  first  of  all.  Having  returned  to  St. 
Paul,  they  then  continued  on  the  steamers 
seven  miles  further  to  Fort  Snelling. 

Fort  Snelling  was  at  that  time  a  fortifica¬ 
tion  large  enough  to  contain  several  thousand 
troops,  and  stood  on  a  commanding  site  about 
three  hundred  rods  from  the  river.  There 
were  seven  buildings,  connected  with  walls, 
and  forming  an  odtagon  about  as  large  as  the 
lower  Green  in  New  Haven.  But  it  was  one 
of  the  relics  of  a  past  period,  and  had  at  that 
time  entirely  lost  its  significance  as  a  military 
post,  the  Indians  having  receded  from  Minne¬ 
sota,  and  the  country  being  invaded  only  by 
the  peaceful  immigrants  of  Germany,  Scandi¬ 
navia,  and  the  Fast. 

On  their  return  from  Fort  Snelling,  the 
excursionists  were  entertained  at  St.  Paul  by 
a  reception  in  the  great  legislative  hall. 

“  The  ladies  of  the  party,”  says  Mr.  Babcock,  11  and 
the  ladies  of  St.  Paul  are  in  full  dress,  and  the  scene 
more  resembles  one  often  observed  in  the  saloons  of 
New  York  than  one  which  could  have  been  anticipated 
in  any  place  in  this  new  Territory.” 

Governor  Gorman,  the  Governor  of  the  Ter¬ 
ritory,  received  the  guests,  addressing  Presi- 

83 


dent  Fillmore  in  particular,  and  welcoming 
the  projectors  of  the  Rock  Island  Railroad, 
the  originators  of  the  excursion,  the  members 
of  the  press,  and  all  present. 

President  Fillmore  replied,  and  was  followed 
by  Mr.  Bancroft.  The  speeches  of  President 
Fillmore  and  Mr.  Bancroft  are  thus  reported 
by  Mr.  Chas.  A.  Dana,  at  that  time  of  the  New 
Y ork  Tribune : 

“  Mr.  Fillmore  replied  at  some  length.  He  said  he 
claimed  no  honor  on  that  occasion.  He  had  come  there, 
expecting  to  travel  altogether  as  a  private  person,  with¬ 
out  being  called  upon  to  address  his  fellow  citizens. 
If  any  man  should  be  especially  honored  there,  it  was 
Mr.  Farnam,  who  had  conducted  with  such  success  an 
entertainment  for  which  history  had  no  parallel,  and 
such  as  no  prince  could  possibly  undertake.  The 
governor  had  alluded  with  approval  to  his  conduct  in 
a  position  it  had  been  his  fortune  to  hold  in  the  Fed¬ 
eral  Government.  He  rejoiced  at  this  unexpected 
approval  of  the  governor,  and  at  that  of  this  vast 
audience.  Next  to  the  approbation  of  his  own  con¬ 
science,  he  valued  that  of  his  fellow  citizens.  The  adt 
of  his  administration  which  had  been  so  kindly  singled 
out  (the  Compromise  of  1850)  was  a  trying  one.  In 
performing  it,  he  was  aware  that  he  ran  counter  to  the 
feelings  of  many  whose  esteem  he  could  not  but  desire 
and  value.  But  he  trusted  that  all  would  now  do  him 
the  justice  to  believe  that  that  adt  was  done  honestly 

84 


and  fearlessly.  Mr.  Fillmore  then  went  on  to  speak 
at  length  of  the  important  position  of  St.  Paul  as  a 
central  point  on  one  of  the  routes  leading  from  the 
Atlantic  to  the  Pacific,  and  to  show  how  necessary  it 
is  to  build  a  railroad  across  the  continent,  if  we  would 
preserve  the  States  of  the  Pacific  and  more  Eastern 
States  in  one  confederacy.  His  observations  on  this 
subject  were  sound  and  clearly  reasoned,  and  were 
listened  to  with  great  attention. 

Mr.  Bancroft  next  spoke,  and  in  behalf  of  the  rail¬ 
road  directors  responded  to  Governor  Gorman’s  wel¬ 
come  in  one  of  those  brilliant  and  facile  improvisations 
which  the  public  sometimes  have  the  fortune  to  hear 
from  his  lips.  He  touched  upon  the  kindly  relations 
that  must  exist  between  the  people  of  Minnesota  and 
those  who  had  opened  to  their  use  this  new  road  on  the 
way  to  the  great  marts  of  our  foreign  commerce,  the 
unprecedented  nature  of  this  excursion  in  which  so  large 
a  number  of  persons  were  conveyed  in  so  agreeable  a 
way,  as  the  guests  of  the  railroad  company,  a  greater 
distance  than  that  from  New  York  to  Liverpool.  I 
do  not  attempt  to  follow  Mr.  Bancroft  through  his 
rapid  and  salient  address,  every  sentence  as  clear 
cut  as  a  finished  statue,  and  delivered  with  admirable 
point  and  distinctness.  Every  passage  was  applauded, 
and  when  he  concluded  by  bidding  Minnesota  to  be 
the  north  star  of  the  Union,  shining  forever  in  un¬ 
quenchable  luster,  there  was  a  general  burst  of  ap¬ 
plause  throughout  the  crowded  room.” 

After  the  reception  was  over,  the  excursion¬ 
ists  returned  to  their  boats,  and  were  soon  on 
85 


their  way  down  the  river  to  Rock  Island.  This 
city  was  reached  June  ioth,  and  the  party 
there  disbanded,  some  members  returning  to 
the  Hast,  others  continuing  their  trip  in  vari¬ 
ous  directions  through  the  West. 

The  thing  most  complained  of  by  the  ex¬ 
cursionists  was  the  lack  of  room  on  the  steam¬ 
boats,  which  obliged  many  of  the  gentlemen 
to  sleep  in  the  saloons  and  on  tables,  and 
which  overcrowded  the  staterooms.  This  was 
due  to  the  faCt  that  many  people  brought 
more  persons  with  them  than  their  tickets  al¬ 
lowed.  It  was  stated  that  there  were  several 
cases  in  which  single  tickets  were  made  to 
serve  for  entire  families  and  their  friends. 
Otherwise,  however,  the  arrangements  seem 
to  have  been  ample.  Mr.  Babcock  says,  in 
describing  the  affair : 

“We  have  had  oysters  and  lobsters  daily,  though 

two  thousand  miles  from  the  sea.  These,  of  course, 

were  brought  in  sealed  cans.  Hens,  turkeys,  and 

ducks  have  given  their  last  squeak  every  morning. 

Two  cows  on  the  lower  deck  furnish  us  with  fresh 

milk  twice  a  day.  Beets  are  cooked,  and  every  variety 

of  stuff,  and  the  dessert  consists  of  all  kinds  of  fruits, 

nuts,  cakes,  confe<5tion  ices,  and  other  things  too 

numerous  to  mention.  Such  is  our  daiR  fare.  Then 

there  are  meats  for  supper,  with  tea  and  coffee,  with 

86 


toast,  dry  and  wet,  cold  bread,  warm  bread,  Indian 
bread,  biscnit,  rolls,  etc.  The  captain  of  our  boat, 
Persie,  is  a  prince  of  a  man,  and  a  particular  favorite 
with  all  the  ladies,  as  well  as  gentlemen.  He  gives 
up  his  entire  boat,  even  his  office,  to  the  use  of  the 
passengers.  Our  friends  on  the  other  steamers  boast 
of  being  as  fortunate,  and  even  insist  that  theirs  is  the 
lucky  boat  with  the  best  company  and  the  best  cap¬ 
tain.  I,  of  course,  go  in  for  our  boat,  the  Golden 
Era,  “our”  captain,  and  our  company;  besides  we 
have  on  board  the  ex-President  of  the  United  States, 
and  Mr.  Farnam,  the  master  spirit  of  the  expedition, 
to  whose  kind  offices  we  are  all  indebted  more  than 
words  can  express.  He  is  everywhere  present,  con¬ 
tributing  all  his  efforts  to  our  instruction,  amusement 
and  comfort.” 

Before  the  party  broke  up,  Mr.  Faruani 
brought  on  board  Mr.  Le  Clerc,  a  half-breed 
Indian,  who  was  at  that  time  a  large  owner  of 
real  estate  in  Davenport.  Mr.  Babcock  says 
of  him  : 

“  He  was  introduced  to  the  passengers,  and  deports 
himself  like  a  gentleman,  though  he  appears  unable 
to  hold  much  conversation  except  in  monosyllables. 
He  has  a  true  Indian  face,  though  his  body  is  of  enor¬ 
mous  size,  his  weight  being  two  hundred  and  fifty  or 
three  hundred  pounds.” 

Mr.  Babcock’s  letter  of  June  9th  thus  de¬ 
scribes  one  of  the  final  scenes  of  the  excursion  : 

87 


“This  business  having  been  disposed  of,  it  was  re¬ 
solved  that  the  ceremony  of  presenting  a  golden  cup 
to  Mr.  Farnam’s  well-behaved  baby  should  take  place 
in  anticipation  of  handing  over  the  goblet  itself,  which 
was  yet  to  be  made.  Accordingly  the  Hon.  John  A. 
Rockwell,  of  Norwich,  Conn.,  was  selected  to  make 
the  address  to  the  infant,  and  Prof.  A.  C.  Twining,  of 
New  Haven,  Conn.,  was  chosen  to  respond  in  behalf 
of  the  child. 

Mr.  Rockwell  discharged  the  duty  assigned  him  in 
a  very  appropriate  manner,  to  the  great  amusement  of 
the  ladies  and  all  present. 

Mr.  Twining  replied,  commencing  with,  ‘  I,  Henry 
W.  Farnam,  being  young  in  years,  and  wholly  unac¬ 
customed  to  public  speaking,  feel  incompetent  to  dis¬ 
charge  in  suitable  terms  the  duty  imposed  upon  me 
on  this  interesting  occasion.  When  I  came  on  board 
this  boat,  it  was  farthest  from  my  expectation  to  make 
a  speech.  ‘  Man  wants  but  little  here  below,’  and 
babies  still  less.  All  my  wants  may  be  confined  within 
this  little  cup  which  you  propose  to  give  me.  Its 
contents  are  a  baby’s  world — his  universe.  ‘  Heaven 
and  earth  and  ocean  plundered  of  their  sweets  ’  may 
be  compressed  within  the  golden  rim  of  this  little 
measure.  Some  babies  might  cry  for  joy  over  my 
good  fortune,  but  I  am  as  unused  to  crying  as  to  pub¬ 
lic  speaking.  I  give  you  my  best  smile  of  thanks  for 
your  kindness,  while  I  rely  upon  my  interpreter  for  a 
further  and  more  mature  expression  of  the  grateful 
emotions  of  my  joyful  little  heart.’  I  may  not  have 
given  you  a  very  correCt  report  of  this  excellent  speech 

88 


on  behalf  of  the  baby  ;  it  should  have  been  heard  to 
be  appreciated.  It  was  an  off-hand  effort,  and  highly 
delighted  the  crowd  of  listeners. 

The  baby  was  taken  off  and  rewarded  with  kisses 
for  his  excellent  deportment  during  the  trying  occa¬ 
sion  of  the  presentation.” 

Before  landing  in  Rock  Island  the  boats 
were  brought  together,  and  a  general  meeting 
was  held  to  adopt  resolutions  expressing  the 
feelings  of  the  party  towards  the  projectors  of 
the  excursion.  Ex-President  Fillmore  pre¬ 
sided  at  this  meeting,  while  Dr.  Bacon  re¬ 
ported  the  resolutions. 


89 


NOTES 


In  the  preparation  of  this  sketch  I  have  looked  over  all  of  my 
father’s  papers  that  I  could  get  access  to.  Unfortunately  they 
do  not  furnish  a  continuous  record  of  events.  Most  of  them 
were  contained  in  two  large  pigeon-holed  boxes,  which  were 
formerly  in  the  office  of  the  Chicago  and  Rock  Island  Railroad 
in  Chicago,  and  were  brought  to  New  Haven  with  other  pieces  of 
furniture  in  1868.  But  while  certain  years  were  quite  well 
represented,  others  were  missing  altogether,  and  what  additional 
papers  might  have  been  found  in  the  office  of  the  company  were 
undoubtedly  destroyed  in  the  Chicago  fire.  I  have  derived  great 
assistance,  however,  from  several  files  of  letters  written  by  Mr. 
Sheffield,  and  from  some  memoranda  which  he  made  for  the 
benefit  of  posterity,  and  sent  to  my  father  a  few  years  before  his 
death.  Both  the  letters  and  the  memoranda  are  written  in  his 
own  even  hand,  and  expressed  with  characteristic  clearness  and 
vigor.  The  publications  that  I  have  made  use  of  include  Presi¬ 
dent  Porter's  sketch  of  my  father  printed  in  Men  of  Progress ,  An¬ 
dreas’  History  of  Chicago ,  in  three  volumes  (1884-1886),  the  files 
of  the  New  Haven  newspapers,  railroad  reports,  and  an  anony¬ 
mous  account  of  the  Farmington  Canal  Co.,  printed  in  1850.  For 
this  pamphlet,  as  well  as  for  valuable  manuscripts  of  Mr.  Sheffield, 
I  am  indebted  to  his  daughter,  Mrs.  John  A.  Porter,  of  this  city. 

I  am  also  indebted  for  the  loan  of  papers  and  for  other  informa- 

90 


tiou  to  Mr.  John  E$-  Henry,  of  Davenport,  Iowa,  to  my  aunt 
Mrs.  Pliilo  Parks,  of  Grinnell,  Iowa,  and  to  the  various  members 
of  my  immediate  family. 

The  portrait  which  is  bound  with  this  volume  is  copied  by  the 
photo  gravure  process  of  Goupil  and  Co.  from  a  photograph 
taken  in  1880. 

I  have,  in  general,  tried  to  avoid  statements  which  were  doubt¬ 
ful,  or  which  needed  qualification.  The  two  cases  in  which  it 
seemed  necessary  to  depart  from  this  rule  are  dealt  with  below. 

1  (p.  20.)  These  figures  are  given  on  page  15,  but  they  do 
not  agree  with  other  figures  given  elsewhere  in  the  pamphlet. 
They  probably  should  read  #1,327,156.54. 

5  (P-  39-)  The  History  of  Chicago,  Vol.  I,  page  259,  gives  Feb¬ 
ruary  20  as  the  date.  The  report  of  the  Michigan  Southern  road 
of  May,  1853,  page  6,  gives  March  as  the  time  of  its  completion 
to  Chicago,  and  May  22  as  that  of  the  opening  of  the  whole 
road. 


91 


MEMORIAL  SERMON 


BY 


REV.  NEWMAN  SMYTH,  D.D. 


A  SERMON 

Preached  by  Rev.  Newman  Smyth,  D.D., 

In  Center  Church,  October  14,  1883. 


Acts  xx,  35.  Remember  the  words  of  the  Lord  Jesus,  how  he 
himself  said,  It  is  more  blessed  to  give  than  to  receive. 

In  this  sacred  place,  where  human  success  must 
own  its  nothingness  before  Almighty  God,  and  our 
human  virtue  confesses  its  need  of  forgiveness  from 
the  charity  of  the  Lord,  I  do  not  propose  to  pronounce 
the  eulogy  of  a  man  ;  but  from  a  life  of  good  will, 
finished  in  benevolence  and  peace,  I  may  properly 
take  upon  this  Sabbath  day  a  text.  There  is  a  hand¬ 
writing  of  God  for  us  to  read  for  our  profit  in  the 
lives  of  all  good  men.  St.  Paul  found  an  epistle  of 
Christ  in  the  characters  of  his  Christian  friends  in 
Corinth,  not  indeed  an  infallible  scripture,  for  there 
were  many  blots  upon  those  first  fair  pages  of  the  new 
Christian  life  in  the  world  ;  but,  nevertheless,  an  epis¬ 
tle  of  Christ  which  the  large-hearted  apostle  loved  to 
read  as  he  saw  it  written,  not  with  ink,  but  with  the 
spirit  of  the  living  God  ;  not  in  tables  of  stone,  but  in 
tables  that  are  hearts  of  flesh.  If  the  spirit  of  truth 
and  love  still  writes  fresh  scriptures  in  the  lives  of 
good  men,  let  us  not  dwell  with  contented  criticism 

upon  their  human  frailties  and  faults,  but  sincerely 
95 


desire  rather  to  discover  the  finer  writing  of  the  spirit 
written  for  our  example  in  the  lives  of  our  friends.  It 
is  one  of  the  pleasant  duties  of  the  pulpit,  not  only  to 
hold  up  for  admiration  lofty  Christian  ideals  of  life, 
but  also  to  keep  in  honorable  remembrance  examples 
of  integrity  and  usefulness  in  the  world.  This  obli¬ 
gation  of  commending  worthy  ambition  and  honorable 
success  among  men  becomes  more  imperative,  when  we 
consider  how  easily  in  this  land  unprincipled  smart¬ 
ness  grasps  golden  prizes  ;  how  strong  is  the  tendency 
to  ingulf  naturally  noble  men  in  the  maelstrom  of  a 
hopeless  materialism  ;  and  how  sometimes  even  Chris¬ 
tian  communities  may  conveniently  forget  to  keep  in 
perpetual  contempt  the  success  of  wealth  or  office 
gained  at  the  price  of  honor.  Should  I  begin,  how¬ 
ever,  to  preach  a  sermon  in  eulogy  of  our  friend,  Mr. 
Henry  Farnam,  or  even  to  give  a  complete  sketch  of 
his  long  and  useful  life,  those  who  knew  him  best  in 
his  genial  simplicity  and  modesty  might  grow  con¬ 
scious  of  an  unpleasant  discord  between  such  public 
speech  of  him  and  the  unostentatious  spirit  of  his  life. 
What  an  old  English  writer  said  of  a  completed  day 
of  his  life  might  better  express  all  that  a  man  of  Mr. 
Farnam’s  mold  would  wish  a  pastor  to  say  of  him, 
after  he  should  be  gone  :  1  ‘  My  desires  I  commit  to 
the  imitation  of  the  weak  ;  my  adtions  to  the  censures 
of  the  wise  and  the  holy  ;  and  my  faults  to  the  judg¬ 
ment  and  redress  of  a  merciful  God.”  Not  so  much 
of  him,  therefore,  let  me  speak  ;  but  rather  from  his 
life  let  me  draw  some  lessons  which  we  can  hardly 
learn  too  much  by  heart. 


96 


I  wish  among  other  objedls  to  avail  myself  of  this 
opportunity  to  remind  you  again  of  our  indebtedness 
to  the  godly  mothers  and  the  stalwart  sons  of  a  gen¬ 
eration  of  men  who  are  now  almost  all  gone  from  us. 
Trained  in  his  youth  by  a  devout  mother,  whom  he 
never  ceased  to  revere,  Mr.  Farnam  was  one  of  a  class 
of  men  who  went  forth  with  good  consciences  and 
good  health,  and  purpose  nerved  by  good  principles, 
to  develop  the  resources  of  this  country,  to  clear  the 
way  through  many  difficulties  for  the  flow  of  our  in¬ 
dustries,  and  to  lay  broad  foundations  upon  which 
other  men  should  build.  I  rode  last  Wednesday 
swiftly  and  in  comfort  up  one  of  our  fertile  valleys, 
past  pleasant  villages  and  prosperous  farms,  to  the 
inland  town  of  Northampton.  The  gentleman  who 
sat  with  me  told  me  of  the  young  man  who  years  ago 
had  often  ridden  in  his  buggy  over  every  foot  of  that 
country,  careless  of  food  or  sleep,  sparing  not  himself 
in  the  attempt  to  keep  an  open  channel  of  communica¬ 
tion  through  that  valley  to  the  sea,  and  who  after¬ 
wards  with  others  pushed  the  railroad  through  over 
which,  I  dare  say,  the  descendants  of  those  earlier 
farmers  may  now  pass  up  and  down,  as  we  travel  un¬ 
thinking,  east  and  west,  taking  the  railways  which 
antedate  our  memory  for  granted  as  though,  with  the 
stone  fences  and  the  old  roads,  they  had  always  been 
there,  the  natural  adjuncts  of  the  soil.  But  this  coun¬ 
try  has  had  makers  and  builders  to  whom  we  owe  our 
ease  and  opportunity  ;  and  another  one  of  these  has 
just  gone  from  among  us.  Honest  work  by  honest 
men  and  the  sons  of  honest  men,  who  went  forth  and 


97 


did  with  their  might  whatsoever  their  hands  found  to 
do,  has  rendered  it  possible  for  us,  with  half  their 
effort  or  their  sacrifice,  to  make  still  larger  gains  in 
ever}-  department  of  industry,  art,  or  science.  It  was 
the  same  power  of  honest  purpose  working  for  the 
future,  wThether  in  the  study  of  a  man  like  Moses 
Stuart,  as  he  pushed  through  an  unknown  language 
determined  in  spite  of  suspicion  and  oppositions  to 
bring  to  his  ledlure  room  the  spoils  of  another  literature, 
or  out  in  the  world  among  the  indefatigable  pioneers 
of  the  civilization  which  now  sits  rejoicing  on  the  hill¬ 
sides,  and  casting  its  line  far  and  wide  over  the  prairies 
wdiich  they  made  habitable.  We  need  not  only  at 
times  to  check  our  tendency  to  boastfulness  by  the 
memory  of  our  indebtedness  to  those  self-made  men 
whose  sagacious  enterprise  has  rendered  our  recent 
rapid  progress  possible  ;  but  we  need  also,  more  than 
this,  to  re-baptize  the  speculative  spirit  of  our  times 
in  the  sober  virtue  which  gave  to  those  men  their  best 
strength.  I  have  heard  Mr.  Farnam  relate  with  the 
happy  unconsciousness  of  an  old  man’s  recollection 
of  a  triumph  of  his  earlier  life,  the  surprise  of  the  city 
of  Chicago  when  the  locomotive  entei'ed  it  over  his 
finished  road  ahead  of  time,  and  the  East  sent  its  mail 
for  the  first  time  all  the  w^ay  by  steam  to  the  up- 
springing  metropolis  of  the  West.  I  have  heard  him 
recount  with  the  freshness  of  a  still  present  pleasure 
the  story  of  that  large  excursion  planned  by  his  gen¬ 
erosity,  when  his  railroad  had  reached  the  banks  of 
the  Mississippi,  and  he  washed  to  give  the  East  a 
chance  to  feel  the  West.  This  chapter  of  his  life  be- 

98 


longs  to  the  history  of  the  remarkable  development  of 
our  railway  system,  whose  end  is  not  yet ;  and  it  was, 
so  far  as  he  added  his  part  in  it,  a  chapter  of  honesty. 
This  is  the  lesson  which  I  would  bring  from  that  por¬ 
tion  of  his  life-work — the  means  which  first  brought 
New  York  and  Chicago  together  were  the  reward  of 
trusted  integrity.  Capital  first  reached  Chicago  over 
a  through  railroad  in  charge  of  an  honest  man. 
Honesty  ran  the  first  through  locomotive  into  Chi¬ 
cago.  Sound  business  integrity,  and  the  confidence 
of  capital  in  proved  integrity,  united  the  Mississippi 
and  the  seaboard.  Mr.  Farnam  never  wrecked  his 
own  railroad,  or  became  receiver  of  his  own  trust. 
There  are  men  who  succeed  in  making  themselves 
rich  by  leaving  all  with  whom  they  do  business  poor. 
This  man  helped  others  while  he  helped  himself.  He 
had  sagacity  to  seize  his  opportunity  ;  but  his  methods 
of  business  never  descended  to  small  shrewdness.  He 
was  trusted  by  others,  and  he  trusted  the  men  whom 
he  employed  ;  few  men  cared  to  presume  upon  his 
confidence,  and  none  more  than  once.  There  was  an 
upright  and  inflexible  will  behind  his  kindliness.  Mr. 
Farnam’s  contempt  for  every  kind,  of  jobbery,  sharp 
practice,  or  meanness,  approached  the  perfedt  hatred 
of  the  Hebrew  psalmist. 

We  have  witnessed  since  his  earlier  enterprise  a  stu¬ 
pendous  development  of  our  railway  system  and  a 
corresponding  expansion  of  our  industries.  Faster 
methods  of  financiering,  as  well  as  of  travel,  have 
come  into  vogue.  The  facility  with  which  capital  can 
now  be  transferred  by  telegraph  to  any  point  of  work 


99 


where  it  is  needed,  is  without  question  a  great  gain 
over  the  undeveloped  banking  system  which  made  it 
necessary  for  Mr.  Farnam  to  carry  time  and  again  sums 
of  fifty  thousand  dollars  in  a  trunk  between  New  York 
and  Chicago.  But  our  greatly  increased  facilities  for 
large  business  operations  have  brought  with  them  also 
tremendous  temptations  to  jobbery  and  corruption. 
Men  make  haste  now  to  mortgage  prospeCls  where  our 
fathers  mortgaged  work.  The  speculative  method  of 
smart  financiering  is  nowadays  to  build  a  house  by 
giving  a  mortgage  on  the  cellar,  and  that  too  before  so 
much  as  a  hole  has  been  dug.  The  principal  thing  in 
much  financiering  now  seems  to  be  to  get  the  money, 
not  to  build  the  house,  at  least  not  thoroughly  and  well. 
Modern  gambling  has  outgrown  the  dice  of  the  an¬ 
cients  and  even  the  tables  languidly  prohibited  bjr  law 
in  our  cities  ;  now  whole  industries,  harvests,  and  rail¬ 
roads  are  the  counters  in  a  game  which  a  few  may  play 
with  the  rights  of  men,  and  sometimes  legislators  seem 
to  be  the  not  uninterested  spectators.  It  would  be 
beyond  my  province  and  my  understanding  to  discuss 
the  ominous  social  and  political  questions  which  the 
growth  of  monopolies  and  the  relations  of  gigantic 
systems  of  private  enterprise,  like  our  railway  lines 
between  the  oceans,  are  thrusting  upon  the  attention 
of  the  country.  I  have  noticed,  however,  that  those 
who  have  studied  most  deeply,  and  grasped  most  com¬ 
prehensively,  any  social  or  political  problem,  are 
usually  the  least  forward  in  pressing  for  remedies 
through  some  new  prohibitions  of  legislation,  and  are 
inclined  to  find  in  the  natural  aCtion  and  reactions  of 


IOO 


the  forces  of  society,  and  in  the  gradual  processes  of 
moral  development,  their  hope  for  the  remedy  of  evils 
which  at  times  seem  to  be  stronger  than  our  laws  and 
beyond  our  power  of  reform.  But  whatever  legisla¬ 
tion  may,  or  may  not,  be  necessary,  there  is  one  point 
of  light  in  these  questions  and  discussions  upon  which 
it  is  the  proper  province  and  one  of  the  duties  of  the 
pulpit  to  keep  the  popular  eye  fixed  ;  and  that  is  this  : 
Capital  and  labor  can  hold  right  and  prosperous  rela¬ 
tions  only  when  both  are  honest ;  and  the  ultimate 
solution  of  all  social  problems  is  an  honest,  God-fear¬ 
ing  community.  Nothing  short  of  that  is  or  can  be  a 
stable  condition  of  society.  And  this  ultimate  princi¬ 
ple  of  Christian  political  economy  is  in  point  in  a  dis¬ 
course  from  the  life  of  Mr.  Farnam.  Capital  trusted 
to  his  hand  did  no  wrong  to  any  man,  but  achieved 
good  for  all  classes  when  it  entered  on  the  first  loco¬ 
motive  the  city  of  Chicago,  and  passed  on  to  touch  the 
bank  of  the  Mississippi.  Labor  had  its  rights,  and 
was  helped  to  help  itself  in  honest  work,  when  an 
honest  man,  who  loved  his  fellow-men,  paid  its  wages. 
And  after  all  our  discussions  and  projects  of  reform, 
shall  we  not  have  to  come  back  to  the  simple  truism 
at  the  basis  of  any  lasting  social  and  political  pros¬ 
perity,  viz.,  the  first  necessity  of  true,  honest,  and 
God-fearing  men  ?  There  was  not  only  benevolence, 
but  the  providence  of  a  far-seeing  statesmanship,  in 
the  building  of  school  houses  and  churches  along  the 
advancing  railroad  by  a  timely  aid  whose  extent 
probably  only  the  giver  ever  knew,  much  of  which  in 
the  after  years  he  himself  had  probably  forgotten. 


IOI 


For  Mr.  Farnam,  I  must  say  it,  had  forgotten  in  his 
life  more  adts  of  benevolence  than  many  richer  men 
than  he  ever  could  have  remembered.  Such  civiliza¬ 
tion,  intelligent  and  Christian,  as  that  which  he  planted 
and  fostered  along  his  railroad  lines,  shall  yet  prove, 
if  we  succeed  in  advancing  it,  the  peaceful  solution  of 
those  grave  problems  which  are  growing  with  the 
greatness  of  the  national  development  whose  begin¬ 
nings  Mr.  Farnam  saw. 

I  turn  now  to  another  phase  of  Mr.  Farnam’ s  life 
from  which  as  a  pastor  I  may  thankfully  take  a  text. 
The  mere  quantity  of  a  man’s  charity  does  not  of 
itself  render  liberality  a  praiseworthy  virtue.  Chris¬ 
tian  charity  is  a  quality  as  well  as  a  quantity.  The 
later  Roman  paganism  knew  how  under  certain  cir¬ 
cumstances  to  lavish  gifts.  The  monumental  inscrip¬ 
tions  of  the  Romans  record  the  names  of  men  who  had 
eredted  public  baths,  given  games,  and  bestowed  lar¬ 
gesses  of  corn  and  wine.  But  Pagan  liberality  never 
learned  the  real  spirit  of  Christian  charity.  Targe 
bequests  have  sometimes  in  our  day  been  given  in 
anything  but  the  true  spirit  and  under  the  higher 
law  of  Christian  charity.  Mr.  Farnam’s  benevolence, 
I  can  most  truthfully  say,  was  not  merely  a  virtue  of 
quantity,  but  also  of  quality.  Indeed,  there  were  some 
cliaradteristics  in  his  manner  of  giving  which  for  our 
sakes  should  be  commended.  One  of  these  happy 
features  of  his  benevolence  was  the  timeliness  of  his 
gifts.  He  believed  in  the  self-multiplying  power  of 
the  help  given  at  just  the  right  time.  This  belief, 
however,  did  not  render  him  tardy  with  his  benefac- 


102 


tions  as  one  waiting  for  the  last  moment  with  reluct¬ 
ant  gift  ;  but  rather  it  made  him  watchful  for  oppor¬ 
tunities  of  good.  And  when  found,  as  they  were 
wherever  he  went,  he  was  quick  in  meeting  them. 
Two  instances  of  many  I  must  give,  which  show,  also, 
that  a  man  willing  and  ready  to  meet  the  providential 
opportunities  of  his  life  will  not  confine  his  liberality 
to  a  single  worn  channel,  or  to  his  own  church  or 
neighborhood.  While  traveling  abroad,  as  I  happen 
to  have  learned,  he  stopped  in  Beyrout,  and  attended 
upon  the  Sabbath  the  exercises  of  one  of  those  girls’ 
schools  which  are  the  adornment  of  our  Christian  mis¬ 
sions  in  the  East.  He  saw  the  possibilities  for  larger 
usefulness,  and  he  took  the  need  for  granted.  Stop¬ 
ping  our  missionary,  Dr.  Thompson,  at  the  close  of 
the  service,  he  asked  him,  although  it  was  Sunday, 
to  help  him  in  a  little  matter  of  business.  The  dodtor 
hesitated  somewhat,  doubtless  fearing  that  he  might 
be  asked  to  aid  in  collecting  the  draft  of  a  stranger. 
Mr.  Farnam  quietly  handed  him  his  check  for  the 
benefit  of  the  school,  which,  when  Dr.  Thompson 
fairly  took  it  in,  caused  him  then  and  there  to  fall 
upon  his  knees  upon  the  floor  and  thank  God  for  the 
help  for  which  with  anxious  hearts  they  had  been 
praying,  and  which  proved  to  be  just  the  help  in  time 
of  need  to  save  the  school.  To  another  instance  of 
the  same  habit  of  seeing  and  adding  at  once  upon  the 
needed  opportunity,  an  instance  of  generosity  nearer 
home,  let  me  refer. 

I  should  state  that  the  letters  to  which  I  now  shall 
allude  have  been  furnished  me  at  my  own  request  by 

I03 


gentlemen  not  in  any  way  connected  personally  with 
Mr.  Farnam,  and  I  assume  the  responsibilit)’  of  mak¬ 
ing  this  public  reference  to  them.  When  in  1869  East 
Divinity  hall  of  the  Yale  seminary  was  in  process  of 
erection,  Mr.  Farnam,  without  a  word  of  solicitation 
having  been  addressed  to  him,  sent  his  check  for  five 
thousand  dollars  to  be  applied  to  that  department  of 
the  college  in  the  new  building,  or  in  an}r  way  its  fac¬ 
ulty  might  deem  best.  He  drew  his  check,  so  he 
wrote,  just  before  leaving  for  the  West,  “  in  case  any 
accident  should  befall  me  but  he  left  directions  not 
to  have  it  delivered  until  after  the  commencement 
week  should  be  over,  as  he  wished  to  prevent  its  get¬ 
ting  into  the  newspapers.  “And  now,”  so  he  con¬ 
cluded  the  letter  accompanying  it,  “I  have  only  one 
more  request  to  make,  and  that  is  that  it  be  kept  out 
of  the  newspapers.”  I  trust  I  do  his  memory  no 
wrong  in  breaking  after  his  death  this  seal  of  silence 
which  he  put  upon  a  good  deed  done.  Again  in  the 
year  1881,  learning  that  an  effort  was  to  be  made  to 
increase  the  endowment  of  the  theological  department 
of  the  college,  without  any  diredt  solicitation  he  wrote 
that  the  friends  of  that  institution  could  rely  upon  him 
for  ten  thousand  dollars  for  that  purpose,  an  amount 
which,  he  said,  he  would  hand  them  in  a  few  days  in 
cash  or  its  equivalent.  What  the  equivalent  in  cash 
for  that  gift  was  in  Mr.  Farnam’s  estimation,  majr  be 
judged  from  the  fact  that  when  the  few  days  had 
elapsed  his  promise  stood  redeemed  in  ten  bonds  bear¬ 
ing  seven  per  cent,  interest  and  worth  at  the  time  in 
the  market  fifteen  cents  above  par.  I  speak  of  these 


104 


instances  rather  than  of  some  of  his  well-known  and 
larger  gifts  to  Yale  College  because  they  illustrate  his 
habit  of  looking  for  the  aid  at  a  given  time  most 
needing  to  be  rendered,  and  his  promptness  in  doing 
what  he  thought  was  for  him  to  do.  When  Mr. 
Farnam  expedted  to  be  absent  for  any  length  of 
time  from  his  place  in  this  sandtuary,  he  would  make 
out  beforehand  and  leave  for  colledtion  his  checks  for 
the  several  contributions  which  he  knew  would  be 
taken  in  his  absence.  So  the  servant  ran  to  meet  the 
Lord’s  will. 

But  I  have  not  touched  upon  that  which  seemed  to 
me  to  be  the  best  thing  in  Mr.  Farnam’s  manner  of  be¬ 
nevolence.  I  think  all  of  you  recognized  an  appropri¬ 
ateness  to  him  in  the  words  chosen  for  my  text  in  his 
memory  ; — these  words  certainly  those  who  knew  him 
well  would  be  willing  to  leave  written  as  his  epitaph 
until  the  Lord  Christ’s  judgment  day;  “It  is  more 
blessed  to  give  than  to  receive.”  He  had  learned 
early  in  life,  and  when  he  had  but  little  to  bestow,  the 
happiness  of  giving.  He  did  not  lose  that  joy  as  his 
fortune  grew.  Riches  are  poverty,  indeed,  if  when 
they  come  the  heart’s  truest  instindts  and  simplest 
pleasures  take  wings  and  fly  away.  Mr.  Farnam  was 
one  of  those  benefadtors  of  their  kind  who  cared  little 
for  money  as  money.  He  loved  all  true  and  happy 
and  friendly  uses  for  his  money.  His  heart  went  with 
his  gifts.  And  so  his  was  the  happiness  of  giving. 
We  sometimes  say  to  ourselves  how  much,  if  we  had 
the  means,  we  should  enjoy  giving  splendid  gifts. 
Perhaps  we  might ;  and  perhaps  we  dream  too  much 


of  finding  happiness  in  the  fame  of  giving  ;  whether, 
if  we  had  much,  we  could  know  the  true  happiness  of 
giving,  depends  upon  the  degree  of  pleasure  we  can 
take  in  doing  the  small  duty  of  ministering,  or  leaving 
the  little  gift  which  we  may  bring.  Men  do  not 
usually  in  later  life  enter  into  the  happiness  of  large 
liberality  if  they  have  not  known  in  their  youth  some¬ 
thing  of  the  joy  of  their  Lord  in  doing  good.  But 
one  who  can  take  pleasure  in  giving,  not  in  the  good 
name  of  it,  not  in  the  honor  of  it,  not  wholly  either 
in  the  consequences  of  it,  but  in  the  act  of  it,  he  has 
learned  a  rich  secret  of  happiness  ;  he  knows  some¬ 
thing  of  a  kind  of  joy  which  our  Lord  himself  called 
blessedness.  Would  that  we  all  knew  more  of  it  in 
little  things  or  large.  And  if  one  has  not  learned  it, 
if  any  one  finds  that  the  act  of  giving  hurts  him,  and 
he  is  a  Christian,  then  by  the  Master’s  own  example 
let  me  urge  him  to  learn  that  rare  secret  of  happiness 
at  any  cost ;  perhaps  only  by  some  decisive  adt  of 
benevolence  which  does  cost,  can  the  habit  of  benevo¬ 
lence  which  is  recognized  as  a  duty  be  made  a  plea¬ 
sure  of  the  soul.  I  cherish  in  memory  two  minor 
incidents  which  let  me  see  the  heartiness  and  simple 
pleasure  of  Mr.  Faruam’s  kindness,  and  at  the  same 
time  his  inability  to  love  money  for  its  own  name’s 
sake.  One,  a  trifling  thing,  but  characteristic,  was 
the  amusement  with  which  he  told  me  how  an  early 
acquaintance  of  his  tried  to  make  his  will.  After 
slowly  dictating  to  his  lawyer  a  few  small  bequests, 
he  suddenly  stopped  short  and  said  no  more.  At 
length  the  lawyer  ventured  to  suggest  that  he  had 


106 


not  yet  disposed  of  a  tenth  part  of  his  property  in  his 
will  ;  rising  suddenly  and  pacing  angrily  the  floor, 
the  man  exclaimed,  “I  will  keep  the  rest  myself.” 
Some  may  be  living  in  this  folly  which  they  would 
laugh  at  when  thus  spoken.  Another  illustration  of 
Mr.  Farnam’s  manner  of  giving,  which  I  must  be 
excused  for  mentioning  here,  was  the  impression 
which  he  made  upon  me  one  morning  when  I  hap¬ 
pened  to  be  with  him  in  his  home  while  he  answered 
one  of  the  many  calls  upon  his  benevolence.  What 
I  noticed  then,  what  lingers  as  a  pleasant  thought 
in  my  memory,  was  the  smile  which  went  with  his 
money.  He  seemed  in  giving  it  to  be  doing  a  favor 
to  himself.  Another  memory  abides  with  me,  of  an¬ 
other  man  not  living  now,  not  known  here,  of  ample 
wealth,  whose  natural  impulse  of  kindness  had  been 
narrowed  and  made  hard  by  the  false,  grasping 
habit  of  his  life.  I  remember  his  look  when  I  asked 
him  to  fulfill  a  promise  which  in  an  unguarded  mo¬ 
ment  of  generous  impulse  he  had  made  to  me  of  a 
small  sum  to  help  a  poor  girl  who  was  making  a 
heroic  struggle  for  herself  and  others  of  her  life.  I 
remember  the  word  about  ‘‘some  other  time;”  I 
remember  how  slowly  from  the  unconverted  pocket 
of,  I  trust,  a  converted  man  that  single  bill  came  to 
the  light ;  I  recall  the  thunder-cloud  upon  the  face  as 
it  passed  from  his  hand  away  forever ;  followed,  I 
acknowledge,  by  a  look  as  of  some  gleam  of  long  for¬ 
gotten  happiness,  when,  after  the  deed  was  done,  the 
first  impulse  of  generosity  came  for  a  moment  to  his 
face  before  he  closed  against  further  appeal  his  gloomy 


107 


bank-vault  of  a  heart.  Do  you  wonder  that  the  Lord 
loveth  the  cheerful  giver  ?  Nor  is  it  well  for  any  of  us 
to  put  off  until  another  world  acquaintance  with  that 
happiness  of  true  benevolence  which  was  the  perfedt 
joy  of  the  Master  on  earth,  who  for  our  sakes,  though 
he  was  rich,  became  poor  ;  and  which  shall  constitute 
so  much  of  the  final  blessedness  of  the  city  of  God 
that  it  is  difficult  to  imagine  how  a  man  who  has  not 
learned  the  secret  of  it  here  can  feel  at  first  in  any  way 
comfortable  in  heaven. 

As  it  has  not  been  my  purpose  in  this  memorial  dis¬ 
course  to  sketch  the  life,  or  to  give  an  exhaustive  analy¬ 
sis  of  the  character  of  Mr.  Famam  ;  as  I  have  not  al¬ 
lowed  myself  to  dwell  upon  the  traits  and  habits  of  the 
man  which  had  endeared  him  to  those  who  had  enjoyed 
his  hospitality  and  which  will  form  the  more  intimate 
and  sacred  memories  of  his  home  ;  I  need  not  now,  on 
the  other  hand,  seek  to  bring  out  the  human  frailty,  or 
to  find  the  faults  in  one  for  whom,  as  for  us  all,  Christ 
the  righteous  died.  My  purpose  has  been  to  preach 
from  the  truth  of  a  life  a  sermon  for  our  use  and  profit. 
To  all  young  men,  especially  to  such  as  have  the  will 
for  work,  I  may  bring  from  this  man’s  success  a 
friendly  word  of  encouragement.  Grant  that  he  grew 
up  in  times  peculiarly  fitted  for  the  achievement  of 
success  ;  grant  that  he  was  fortunate  in  gaining  early 
the  confidence  of  friends  who  helped  him  forward  ; 
still  his  successful  life  and  honored  age  are  proof  of 
the  power  of  certain  right  principles  which,  if  followed 
out,  under  any  circumstances,  can  hardly  fail  to  make 
in  the  end  for  any  man  friends  and  happiness.  It  is 


108 


encouraging  to  refledt  that  a  boy  who  went  in  his 
eighteenth  year  from  the  farm  with  only  himself  with 
which  to  win  his  way,  and  who  dutifully  gave  to  his 
father  a  note  for  the  remainder  of  his  time  until  he 
should  be  twenty-one  ;  who  made  up  his  mind  what 
work  he  wanted  to  do,  and  when  he  applied  for  a 
position  upon  the  corps  of  engineers  on  the  Erie  canal, 
upon  being  told  that  the  only  position  vacant  was  that 
of  cook,  was  not  ashamed  to  say  at  once,  “Then  I 
will  take  that the  youth  who  upon  his  first  small 
salary  helped  another  young  man  to  gain  a  start  ;  and 
who,  as  opportunity  widened  and  prosperity  advanced, 
was  careless  of  his  own  comfort  and  ease,  of  where  he 
slept  or  what  he  ate,  so  long  as  he  did  the  work  which 
he  was  trusted  by  others  to  do  ; — he  has  been  fortunate 
in  his  life,  permitted  by  a  kind  providence  to  live  to 
enjoy  with  others  the  fruit  of  his  toil,  and  to  die  in 
peace,  surrounded  by  friends,  and  with  the  good-will 
of  a  city  at  his  door.  His  last  ride,  the  afternoon  of 
that  day  when  death  stole  through  the  evening  shadows 
to  lay  its  hand  upon  his  lips,  and  with  gentle  touch  to 
take  him  in  sleep  away,  his  last  look  upon  this  city  of 
our  homes  was  from  that  drive  which  bears  his  name  ; 
and  not  the  cold  marble  nor  the  words  graven  upon 
stone  shall  be  the  monument  of  his  benignant  age  : 
rather  the  happiness  of  children  and  youth  let  loose 
among  those  trees  ;  the  pleasure  of  many  who  from 
the  turns  of  that  almost  Alpine  path  shall  catch  views 
of  meadow  and  stream,  and  a  city  of  homes  among  the 
elms,  and  of  the  expanse  of  water  and  the  sky  beyond  ; 
this  delight  of  ours  and  of  our  children’s  children  in 


the  freshness  of  many  springtimes  and  the  colors  of 
many  autumns  to  come,  shall  be  the  true  memorial  of 
his  life  ;  that  path  itself  reminds  us  who  knew  him  of 
the  life  of  him  from  whom  it  has  its  name — -a  path  rising 
easily  from  the  public  highway,  nowhere  abruptly 
broken  or  descending,  yet  having  its  obstacles  to 
turn  and  its  difficulties  to  be  surmounted,  a  narrow 
way  at  times  shut  in  on  either  hand,  yet  steadily 
holding  its  determined  course  and  going  higher,  with 
broad,  fair  prospedt  at  the  summit,  above  the  city’s 
stir,  and  nearer  the  peace  of  heaven. 

Men  and  brethren,  because  this  man  has  gone  from 
us,  ours  is  a  greater  work  to  do.  His  work  is  done  ; 
ours  remains  yet  a  little  while.  From  this  pulpit, 
built  upon  Puritan  principle,  let  no  man  living  or 
among  the  dead  be  honored  above  his  brethren,  or 
praised  after  he  has  gone  hence,  on  account  of  his 
birth,  or  his  wealth,  or  his  prosperity.  As  in  the 
Master’s  presence,  let  the  childlike  spirit  here  be  held 
greatest  of  all.  And  he  that  is  greatest  among  you 
shall  be  your  servant.  In  this  spirit  may  God  help 
us  all  to  use  and  to  enjoy  whatever  we  possess,  and 
to  do  happily  without  whatever  we  have  not.  May 
our  lives,  following  the  example  of  the  true  men  and 
women  who  are  going  from  us,  so  far  as  they  have 
followed  Christ,  and  carrying  on  to  still  larger  uses 
whatever  of  good  for  their  fellow  men  they  have  done 
on  earth,  abound  more  and  more  in  every  good  word 
and  work  until  the  Master  comes. 


IIO 


ARTICLES 

FROM 

THE  NEW  HAVEN  NEWSPAPERS 

AND 


RESOLUTIONS 


The  following  account  of  the  funeral  services  was  printed  in  the 
Morning  News  of  October  9,  1883. 

Yesterday  afternoon  at  2  o’clock,  the  funeral  services 
over  the  remains  of  the  late  Henry  Farnam  were  held 
at  his  late  residence  on  Hillhouse  avenue.  The  casket 
in  which  the  remains  were  inclosed  was  richly  covered 
with  black  broadcloth  and  the  silver  plate  bore  the 
inscription  : 

Born  Nov.  9,  1803. 

HENRY  FARNAM. 

Died  Odt.  4,  1883. 

Upon  the  casket  were  a  wreath  of  ivy  and  autumn 
leaves,  a  sheaf  of  wheat,  and  branches  of  palms.  The 
Center  Church  choir,  consisting  of  Miss  Z.  Hazlett, 
Miss  Maggie  Roberts,  Mr.  P.  W.  Bush,  and  Mr.  G. 
M.  Bush,  opened  the  services  by  singing  the  hymn, 
“Thy  Will  Be  Done,”  after  which  the  Rev.  Dr. 
Newman  Smyth  made  a  short  address,  as  follows  : 

‘  ‘  The  messenger  of  the  Lord  has  come  to  this  house, 
and  now  that  God’s  message  has  been  heard  we  must 
say,  ‘  His  will  be  done.’  We  who  are  here,  many  of 
us  who  are  strangers  to  one  another,  know  that  he  was 
the  friend  of  all  of  us.  A  part  of  Mr.  Farnam’s  life 
belonged  to  the  public.  There  are  many  lessons  to  be 
drawn  from  his  life  as  a  citizen,  a  good  citizen,  and  as 
a  public  man,  although  he  held  no  public  station  ;  and 
I  shall  avail  myself  of  the  opportunity  in  my  own  pulpit 
to  speak  of  these  at  another  time.  To-day  we  would 
not  in  measured  words  speak  the  tribute  of  the  man 
who  has  passed  away  ;  we  mourn  now  with  those  who 


“3 


mourn.  Through  his  honored,  useful  life,  many  of 
you  have  known  him  as  a  neighbor,  have  felt  his 
genial  kindness,  and  have  learned  to  love  him  for  his 
kindness  and  goodness.  He  was  a  friend  and  a  father 
to  many.  God  be  praised  for  this  life  of  his  ;  God 
be  praised  for  all  he  has  been  in  life.  He  was  not  a 
man  easily  inclined  to  unveil  his  inner  soul  ;  he  was 
a  man  of  unobtrusive  manners,  of  devout  spirit,  inter¬ 
ested  in  all  Christian  work,  in  all  Christian  missions, 
and  with  a  love  of  all  that  is  good.  As  a  pastor,  in 
the  name  of  my  Master  and  his,  I  can  repeat :  1  Inas¬ 
much  as  ye  have  done  it  unto  one  of  the  least  of  these 
my  brethren,  ye  have  done  it  unto  Me.’  ” 

‘  ‘  God  knows  how  hard  it  is  to  carry  from  our 
homes  those  whom  we  love.  As  his  nearest  friends 
return  to  his  home,  shall  not  the  spirit  of  his  life  be 
like  a  kindly,  cheerful  greeting  here  ?  It  is  not  gold 
or  silver  that  has  made  this  home,  but  love.  He 
leaves  with  us  a  benediction  of  good  cheer,  and  hope, 
and  love.  We,  as  we  go  by  this  door,  remembering  him 
as  a  friend  of  the  city,  may  have  our  own  lives  inspired 
by  his  usefulness.  Shall  we  not  find  our  burdens  of 
care  become  lightened,  as  we  remember  him  whom  we 
have  known,  whom  we  love,  and  whom  we  hope  to 
meet  again  in  the  activities  of  eternal  life?” 

Prayer  was  offered  by*  President  Porter  of  Yale 
College.  The  interment  was  in  the  Grove  street 
cemetery.  The  bearers  were  President  Woolsey,  Pro¬ 
fessor  Twining,  Dr.  Robertson,  ex-Governor  James 
E.  English,  G.  W.  Curtis,  Eli  Whitney,  Richard  S. 
Fellowes  and  Professor  Silliman. 


U4 


An  article  by  Professor  Fisher,  printed  in  the  Journal  and  Cou¬ 
rier,  October  5,  1883. 

An  honored  citizen,  whose  physical  presence,  so 
gracious  in  its  simple  dignity,  was  itself  a  benedic¬ 
tion — a  noble  man,  whom  none  who  knew  could  fail 
to  love — has  passed  away.  By  a  kind  providence, 
his  closing  days  were,  for  the  most  part,  free  from 
pain.  His  friends  were  spared  the  anguish  of  see¬ 
ing  him  suffer,  him  whose  heart  was  always  ten¬ 
derly  alive  with  sympathy  for  others,  and  quick  to 
devise  means  for  their  relief.  It  was  the  privilege 
of  the  writer  of  these  paragraphs  to  spend  with  him 
a  portion  of  the  evening  previous  to  the  attack  of 
illness  which  proved  fatal.  The  same  benignity 
and  gentleness,  the  same  unaffected,  genial  courtesy 
which  always  marked  his  manner,  attended  him  to 
the  end. 

Mr.  Farnam  was  a  man  of  strong  understanding. 
His  intelligence  was  quick  and  penetrating.  He 
seized  on  the  main  points  of  any  question  that  en¬ 
gaged  his  attention.  Not  born  to  affluence,  but 
obliged  in  early  life  to  earn  his  own  livelihood,  he, 
nevertheless,  availed  himself  to  the  full  of  the  means 
of  intellectual  improvement  within  his  reach.  Pas¬ 
sages  of  good  authors,  like  Cowper,  whom  he  had 
read  in  his  earlier  days,  he  retained  in  memory.  In 
an  important  degree  he  made  himself  what  he  was. 
His  prosperity  was  his  own  achievement.  It  was  due 
to  his  own  manly  energy,  enterprise,  perseverance, 
and  uprightness.  But  he  had  none  of  the  faults  and 


Il5 


foibles  that  are  commonly  attributed  to  self-made 
men.  No  one  could  be  more  unaffectedly  modest. 
A  self-respect,  never  obtrusively  manifested,  but  serv¬ 
ing  as  an  effectual  shield  against  aggression,  accom¬ 
panied  that  uniform  consideration  and  regard  for 
others  which  were  inbred  in  his  character.  He  hon¬ 
ored  learning  and  institutions  of  learning.  He  in¬ 
dulged  in  reminiscences  of  his  own  honorable  career 
without  the  least  appearance  of  self-flattery,  and  no 
farther  than  was  natural  to  a  man  who  was  looking 
back  in  a  season  of  repose  upon  the  events  of  a  suc¬ 
cessful  and  laborious  life.  His  occupations  had 
brought  him  into  close  acquaintance  with  various 
individuals  of  uncommon  powers  of  mind,  like  James 
Hillhouse.  They  had  known  how  to  value  his  worth, 
and  he  in  turn  took  pleasure  in  recalling  his  inter¬ 
course  with  them.  For  the  public  men  of  a  former 
day,  especially  for  Webster,  the  men  whom  he  had 
heard  and  admired,  he  had  an  enthusiastic,  yet  dis¬ 
criminating  admiration. 

A  large  minded  man,  Mr.  Farnam  was  marked  out 
for  large  undertakings.  A  work  like  that  which  he 
accomplished  in  conjunction  with  Mr.  Sheffield,  of 
connecting  Chicago  and  the  interior  cities  with  the 
Mississippi  by  a  railway,  was  congenial,  not  only  with 
the  business  taste,  and  capacity,  but,  alst>,  with  the 
generous  patriotic  sentiments  which  distinguished 
him.  It  need  not  be  said  that  in  all  his  enterprises  he 
was  governed  by  an  integrity  that  could  never  be 
tempted  to  infliCt  a  wrong.  He  instantly  turned  aside 
from  every  scheme,  however  enticing  from  a  pecuni- 

116 


ary  point  of  view,  the  moment  he  saw  in  it  the  least 
taint  of  fraud.  To  enrich  himself  at  the  cost  of  other 
men  or  of  his  country,  would  have  given  him  no  sen¬ 
sation  of  pleasure.  He  might  have  added  vast  sums 
to  his  worldly  store,  and,  probably,  without  incurring 
serious  public  reproach,  had  he  been  less  scrupulous 
in  his  judgment  as  to  what  stridt  honesty  demands  of 
business  men. 

Mr.  Farnam  has  stood  in  this  community  for  years 
as  an  example  of  beneficence.  It  was  unostentatious 
beneficence.  It  embraced  the  entire  circle  of  his 
kinsfolk.  But  there  it  did  not  stop.  It  extended  to 
public  institutions  of  education  and  charity,  and  to 
families  and  individuals  without  number  who  were  in 
need.  His  generous  gifts  flowed  out  in  an  almost 
incessant  stream.  One  of  his  very  last  adts  was  the 
procuring  of  drafts  to  be  sent  to  persons  at  a  distance 
whom  he  wished  to  help.  This  was  on  the  afternoon 
just  previous  to  his  prostration  by  illness.  But  there 
was  no  day  of  his  life  when  death  would  not  have 
surprised  him  in  the  adt  of  doing  good  to  his  fellow 
men.  Giving,  in  the  case  of  Mr.  Farnam,  fulfilled  its 
idea.  It  was  not  from  vanity  or  for  applause.  It 
was  not  even  from  the  pressure  of  a  sense  of  duty, 
although  conscience  was  the  regulative  principle  to 
which  he  was  habitually  loyal.  Mr.  Farnam  was  not 
amenable  to  the  censure  which  a  poet  (in  the  “  Vision 
of  Sir  Faunfal  ”)  attaches  to  benevolence  springing 
from  the  constraint  of  obligation  : 

1 1  He  gives  nothing  but  worthless  gold, 

Who  gives  from  a  sense  of  duty.  ’  ’ 


He  gave  out  of  a  heartfelt  sympathy.  Love  was 
the  animating  principle.  The  gift  seemed  to  be  suf¬ 
fused  with  the  spirit  of  benevolence  from  which  it 
emanated.  It  was  “twice  blessed.”  It  made  the 
giver  happy  not  less  than  the  recipient.  The  service 
rendered  to  a  community  by  a  man  of  this  stamp  is 
far  from  being  measured  by  the  particular  benefits 
that  result  from  his  various  benefactions.  As  an  ex¬ 
ample  to  others,  as  a  living  illustration  of  Christian 
goodness,  as  inspiring  men  with  a  higher  conception 
of  what  human  nature  is  capable  of,  as  diffusing 
abroad  the  joy  which  arises  from  a  common  admira¬ 
tion  of  a  noble  and  generous  soul,  the  life  of  such  a 
man  is  of  incalculable  benefit.  In  the  bestowal  of 
his  charities,  as  in  all  his  condudt,  Mr.  Farnam  dis¬ 
covered  the  innate  refinement  of  his  nature.  He  kept 
himself  in  the  background.  He  shunned  all  noise  and 
parade.  Very  much  that  he  did  was  done  silently, 
and  was  known  only  within  the  limits  of  his  own 
household — the  bereaved  household  where  that  ‘  ‘  good 
gray  head  ”  will  no  more  be  seen. 

Mr.  Farnam  revered  God.  None  who  knew  him 
well  could  fail  to  discern  that  religious  faith  and  love 
were  deep  and  controlling  sentiments  in  his  heart. 
If  he  said  little  on  these  sacred  themes,  it  was  because 
they  were  sacred.  They  pertained  to  the  profound 
experiences  which  it  is  more  hard  for  some  men  than 
for  others  to  expose  to  the  light.  In  the  familiar 
verses  of  Leigh  Hunt,  the  angel  had  not  found  the 
name  of  Abou  Ben  Adhem  on  his  list  of  ‘  ‘  those  who 
Love  the  Lord.”  Then 


“Abou  spoke  more  low, 

But  cheerly  still ;  and  said,  ‘  I  pray  thee  then 
Write  me  as  one  who  loves  his  fellow  men.’ 

The  angel  wrote  and  vanish’d.  The  next  night 
It  came  again,  with  a  great  wakening  light, 

And  show’d  the  names  whom  love  of  God  had  bless’d, 
And,  lo  !  Ben  Adhem’s  name  led  all  the  rest.” 

It  has  not  been  the  design  of  the  present  writer  to 
delineate  the  charadter  of  Mr.  Farnam.  That  is  left 
to  other  pens  and  voices.  What  is  here  said  is  but  an 
imperfedt  expression  of  the  sincere  respedt  and  love  of 
one  whose  privilege  it  had  been  for  a  series  of  years 
to  enjoy  the  friendship  of  one  of  the  noblest  of  men. 


G.  P.  F. 


An  article  by  President  Porter,  printed  in  The  Palladium , 
October  S,  1883. 

New  Haven  buries  to-day  one  of  its  most  conspicu¬ 
ous  and  honored  citizens.  It  is  no  exaggeration  to 
say  that  no  man  has  of  late  been  more  generally  es¬ 
teemed  and  loved  than  Henry  Farnam.  The  promi¬ 
nent  incidents  of  his  life  have  already  been  given  to 
the  public.  It  is  thought  that  some  notice  of  his  per¬ 
sonal  character,  as  it  was  formed  and  developed  by  the 
circumstances  of  his  life,  may  not  be  uninteresting  or 
unprofitable.  The  writer  has  had  unusual  opportuni¬ 
ties  to  know  these  circumstances  and  to  estimate  their 
influence  in  forming  a  character  of  unusual  strength 
and  attractiveness,  as  well  as  of  distinguished  useful¬ 
ness  and  individuality.  If  he  shall  write  with  more 
ardor  than  may  seem  to  comport  with  the  severity  of 
truth,  he  begs  his  critics  to  remember  that  he  writes 
from  an  intimacy  of  personal  knowledge  which  war¬ 
rants  him  in  speaking  with  confidence. 

Mr.  Farnam’s  birth  and  early  training  were  in 
western  New  York,  before  the  Erie  canal  was  finished, 
and  almost  before  it  was  projected.  He  knew  much 
of  this  region  when  it  was  an  unbroken  forest,  more 
of  it  when  its  wheat-fields  and  meadows  were  filled 
with  stumps  and  many  of  its  roads  were  rough  and  at 
times  impassable,  when  produce  was  drawn  to  Albany, 
and  even  to  many  of  the  nearest  mills  and  market 
towns,  at  an  enormous  cost,  and  when  manifold  incon¬ 
veniences,  as  well  as  hardships,  were  familiar  to  the 
daily  life,  even  of  the  most  prosperous.  But  he  lived 
in  a  community  of  aCtive-minded  and  strong-hearted 


120 


men  and  women,  who  recognized  duty  to  God  and  love 
to  man  as  controlling  springs  of  action,  and  who  valued 
education  and  intelligence  as  of  supreme  importance. 
The  variety  of  the  population  brought  in  a  certain 
liberality  which  was  strange  to  the  traditionary  New 
England  rigor,  and  the  hope  and  elasticity  peculiar  to 
a  new  country  gave  spring  and  elasticity  to  the 
thoughts  and  feelings,  even  when  they  led  them 
astray.  His  education  at  home  was  fortunate.  His 
own  mother  was  as  remarkable  in  her  way  as  was  the 
son  in  his — simple,  self-relying,  benevolent,  and  strong- 
hearted,  till  her  death  in  1873,  at  the  age  of  nearly 
ninety-eight.  He  was  a  good  student  and  an  enthusi¬ 
astic  lover  of  mathematics,  pure  and  applied.  Early 
in  life,  it  was  his  good  fortune  to  come  under  the  influ¬ 
ence  of  Mr.  David  Thomas,  the  county  surveyor.  Mr. 
Thomas  was  a  Quaker  and  a  gentleman  of  the  plain 
and  solid  sort,  full  of  love  and  shrewdness,  who  taught 
him  mathematics  and  surveying,  and  most  of  all  ex¬ 
emplified  in  his  own  household  the  dignity  and  beauty 
of  a  truthful  and  loving  life.  Mr.  Farnam  never 
wearied  in  recalling  and  relating  the  scenes  and  con¬ 
versations  which  attended  his  opening  youth  and  early 
manhood,  and  it  was  evident  that  Mr.  Thomas  occu¬ 
pied  a  prominent  place  in  his  love  and  memory. 
Through  influence  of  Mr.  Thomas  and  Mr.  Davis 
Hurd,  he  was  attached  to  the  corps  of  engineers  who 
laid  out  and  constructed  the  western  portion  of  the 
Erie  canal,  and  found  in  this  employment  a  congenial 
field  for  the  activities  and  tastes  which  determined  the 
destiny  of  his  life.  That  he  was  able  and  faithful,  was 


12 1 


proved  by  his  rapid  promotion.  That  his  mind  was 
stimulated  by  the  society  and  attractions  which  were 
incidental  to  this  life,  was  proved  by  the  astonishing 
familiarity  which  he  acquired  with  the  history  of  the 
political  parties  and  the  conspicuous  men  of  New  York, 
in  those  exciting  times  of  New  York  politics,  all  of 
which  he  could  recite  with  the  utmost  accuracy  and 
fullness.  Even  at  that  early  age,  he  was  no  idle  spec¬ 
tator  in  political  life,  but  was  an  ardent  thinker  and 
personal  aCtor  in  public  affairs. 

In  1825,  at  the  age  of  twenty-two,  he  came  to  Con¬ 
necticut  as  first  assistant  engineer  in  the  laying  out 
and  construction  of  the  Farmington  canal.  In  1827 
he  became  chief  engineer,  and  from  that  time  forward 
was  intrusted  with  the  chief  and  almost  sole  responsi¬ 
bility  of  constructing  and  managing  and  repairing  the 
same  until  1846,  when  the  railway  took  its  place. 
This  canal  was  supported  by  the  co-operation  of  a  few 
citizens,  who  gave  cordially  of  their  sympathy  but 
sparingly  of  their  subscriptions.  Conspicuous  among 
these  friends  was  the  Hon.  James  Hillhouse,  who 
seems  from  the  first  to  have  won  his  reverence  and 
his  love  to  an  extraordinary  degree.  The  ardent  and 
public  spirited  old  man  not  only  believed  in  the  suc¬ 
cess  of  the  canal,  but  was  ready  to  give  to  it  all  his 
time  and  his  strength.  By  day  and  by  night,  in  storm 
and  in  sunshine,  during  summer’s  heat  and  van  ter’ s 
cold,  he  was  with  his  young  engineer  in  the  field,  en¬ 
countering  all  sorts  of  inconveniences,  equalty  re¬ 
gardless  of  them  all.  It  is  not  surprising  that,  laden 
with  political  honors  and  not  forgetful  of  his  federal 


122 


principles,  abounding  with  anecdotes  of  other  men 
and  other  times,  and  overflowing  with  enthusiasm,  he 
should  have  gained  the  confidence  of  such  a  young 
man  as  was  Mr.  Farnam,  and  that  Mr.  Hillhouse 
should  till  the  day  of  his  own  death  have  felt  toward 
and  talked  of  him  as  an  adopted  son.  There  were 
also  other  good  and  eminent  men  whom  Mr.  Farnam 
found  in  Connecticut,  whom  he  learned  to  respedt  and 
honor.  Mr.  Hillhouse' died  in  1832,  the  staunchest 
and  sturdiest  supporter  of  the  canal,  leaving  Mr.  Far¬ 
nam  to  bear  the  load  of  its  responsibility  for  several 
years.  New  Haven  was  a  small  city  of  some  8,000  to 
10,000  inhabitants,  with  a  limited  back  country  with 
by  no  means  the  most  fertile  soil,  in  imagined,  if  not 
real,  competition  with  Hartford,  which  was  surrounded 
by  a  rich  agricultural  region  and  commanded  the  rich 
valley  of  the  Connecticut.  What  was  more  annoying, 
New  Haven  itself  was  discouraged  and  disunited  in 
respect  to  the  canal,  the  responsibility  for  which  was 
devolved  upon  Mr.  Farnam.  How  faithfully  and 
patiently  he  labored,  by  day  and  by  night,  in  sun¬ 
shine  and  in  storm,  his  most  intimate  friends  only 
know.  How  quick  he  was  to  meet  any  summons  of 
duty  at  any  place,  how  often  he  drove  in  his  one- 
horse  wagon  from  New  Haven  to  Northampton  and 
any  place  between  to  meet  many  a  sudden  exigency, 
and  how  often  that  exigency  involved  a  loss  by  flood 
of  thousands  of  dollars,  no  one  but  himself  and  his 
family  can  tell.  The  end  came  at  last,  the  poor  canal 
became  in  small  part  his  property  and  a  source  of 
some  income  beyond  his  salary. 


These  details  are  recited,  because  they  were  to  ex¬ 
emplify  Mr.  Farnam’s  character.  During  all  this 
period  of  struggle  he  was  almost  alone  in  labor,  in 
watchfulness,  in  self-denial  and  undaunted  courage, 
with  a  scanty  salary,  and  no  specially  flattering  pros¬ 
pects  for  the  future.  His  habits  were  frugal,  and  his 
savings  were  moderate.  He  was,  however,  generous 
from  the  first.  This  fact  deserves  special  attention, 
for  the  reason  that  an  impression  may  have  been 
formed,  that  the  abundant  and  willing  liberality  of 
his  later  life  began  with  the  large  increase  of  his 
wealth,  and  that  the  generous  gifts  of  his  life  were 
simply  the  casual  overflow  of  a  superabundant  income. 
This  was  by  no  means  true.  Long  before  the  Canal 
railroad  was  ever  thought  of,  while  Mr.  Farnam  was 
painfully  travelling  between  New  Haven  and  North¬ 
ampton  in  his  one-horse  wagon,  he  had  begun  to  evince 
that  generous  and  helpful  spirit  which  was  so  con¬ 
spicuous  in  the  years  that  followed.  Not  a  few  of  the 
living  and  the  dead  could  testify,  that  at  that  period 
by  his  kindly  help  and  his  generous  confidence  he  had 
aided  many  to  success  in  the  early  struggles  of  their 
life,  and  set  scores  of  men  on  the  road  to  affluence. 
One  of  the  most  loving  of  his  friends,  who  very  re¬ 
cently  died,  was  helped  to  the  beginnings  of  a  consid¬ 
erable  fortune  by  Mr.  Famam’s  generous  assistance, 
which  was  disposed  of  largely  in  benefactions,  stimu¬ 
lated,  as  he  said,  by  Mr.  Farnam’s  example.  “So 
shines  a  good  deed  in  a  naughty  world.’’ 

Mr.  Farnam’s  subsequent  career  in  enterprise  and 
acquisition  and  liberality  needs  only  be  referred  to. 


124 


The  change  in  his  circumstances  made  no  change  in 
his  character,  except  as  his  intellect  was  stimulated 
by  larger  enterprises,  his  respeCt  for  great  and  good 
men  and  his  detestation  of  bad  men  were  deepened,  as 
his  acquaintance  with  both  classes  was  enlarged,  his 
confidence  in  his  own  resources  w’as  strengthened,  and 
the  confidence  of  the  ablest  and  best  men  of  the 
country  in  his  integrity  and  sagacity  was  more  firmly 
fixed.  From  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  his  career 
he  has  been  the  same  self-relying,  modest,  affectionate, 
true-hearted,  generous  man.  His  career  has  in  many 
respedts  been  brilliant  for  its  enterprise  and  its  success. 
Many  would  say  that  the  circumstances  which  favored 
him  have  been  extraordinary,  but  on  a  second  view 
of  his  career,  it  will  be  seen  that  these  circumstances 
have  to  a  large  extent  been  created  by  his  own  indi¬ 
vidual  force  and  goodness.  His  connection  with  Mr. 
Sheffield,  it  is  true,  gave  him  access  to  the  capitalists 
of  the  country,  but  his  own  skill  and  integrity  first 
won  for  him  the  confidence  of  Mr.  Sheffield,  and  both 
together,  with  the  experience  of  each  in  the  railway 
which  was  designed  to  conned  New  York  with 
Springfield  and  Boston,  were  needed  to  give  effect  to 
Mr.  Farnam’s  forecast  of  what  the  railway  would  do 
for  the  Prairie  States  ;  to  give  him  courage  to  finish 
the  first  link,  which  had  so  long  waited  to  conneCt 
New  York  with  Chicago,  and  which  had  waited  so 
long  for  a  master  to  forge  it,  then  to  conneCt  Chicago 
with  the  Mississippi,  next  to  finish  this  railway  months 
before  the  time  agreed  upon,  to  the  well  deserved 
profit  of  the  contractors,  to  set  off  toward  the  Pacific, 


I25 


and  last  to  designate  him  as  one  of  the  parties  who 
should  be  among  the  foremost  in  the  first  charter  of 
the  Union  Pacific  Railway  Company.  It  is  worthy  of 
notice,  that  the  reputation  for  integrity  which  had 
contributed  so  largely  to  these  splendid  successes,  did 
not  suffer  in  the  bright  noon  of  his  splendid  prosperity, 
nor  during  the  later  years  of  a  life  which  continued  to 
be  successful  to  the  end.  That  he  should  be  prosperous 
was  a  matter  of  course  with  his  “troops  of  friends,’’ 
to  whom  he  had  lent  a  helping  hand,  with  his  knowl¬ 
edge  of  markets  and  of  men,  and  the  sagacity  wrhich 
comes  from  ‘  ‘  old  experience,  ’  ’  but  his  name  was  never 
tainted  with  the  suspicion  of  being  a  manipulating 
director,  who  ‘  ‘  slaughtered  his  own  railway  in  Wall 
street,’’  ora  “receiver,’’  who  “wrecked’’  it  for  his 
personal  profit.  Nothing  wras  more  noticeable  than 
the  detestation  in  which  he  held  practices  of  this  sort, 
and  the  mixture  of  simplicity  and  scorn  with  which  he 
looked  upon  manipulations  of  ever}'  kind  wdiich  devi¬ 
ated  from  the  obvious  rules  of  business  sagacity  and 
forecast.  Perhaps  the  most  interesting  trait  of  his 
character  was  the  unconscious  combination  of  the 
‘  ‘  prophetic  strain  ’  ’  which  came  from  his  wise  ex¬ 
perience,  and  the  artless  simplicity  of  the  open-hearted 
childhood,  which  he  never  could  outgrow. 

His  public  spirit  was  a  passion.  Wherever  he  lived, 
he  became  interested  at  once  in  the  possible  improve¬ 
ment  of  the  community,  and  he  made  it  a  matter  of 
personal  enthusiasm.  When  his  country  was  in  dan¬ 
ger,  though  eminently  a  man  of  peace,  he  threw  him¬ 
self  into  the  conflict  with  the  fire  of  excited  personal 


126 


feeling,  and  felt,  as  he  often  said,  that  he  did  not  desire 
to  live,  if  disunion  was  to  triumph. 

We  have  already  adverted  to  his  open-handed  liber¬ 
ality,  as  begun  in  his  early  life  and  continued  to  the 
end.  The  habit  of  helping  his  fellow  men  was  formed 
in  his  early  business  life,  as  could  be  shown  by  many 
striking  examples,  and  it  was  so  cherished  and  ma¬ 
tured  as  finally  to  become  to  him  one  of  the  chief 
sources  of  occupation  and  enjoyment.  His  gifts  dur¬ 
ing  his  residence  in  Chicago,  as  his  wealth  increased, 
were  incessant  and  various,  and  took  almost  every  con¬ 
ceivable  form  of  public  and  private  benefactions,  and 
to  the  end  of  his  life  he  continued  to  send  westward 
his  liberal  responses  to  the  incessant  applications 
which  were  made  to  him.  To  how  many  churches 
and  colleges  and  seminaries  he  sent  his  benefactions, 
no  one  could  venture  to  reckon,  nor  how  quickly  he 
anticipated  some  of  their  calls,  as  in  the  wise  and  lov¬ 
ing  telegraphic  dispatch  which  he  sent  before  the 
fire  in  Chicago  was  extinguished.  It  would  not  be 
easy  to  count  how  many  subscriptions  of  $5,000  he 
has  given  to  astonished  applicants.  His  large  contri¬ 
butions  to  Yale  College  have  amounted,  in  one  form 
and  another,  to  between  $70,000  and  $80,000.  His 
gift  of  the  drive  in  the  East  Rock  Park  which  is 
known  by  his  name  was  thoroughly  characteristic,  in 
matter  and  in  manner.  He  did  not  care  to  distinguish 
himself  early  by  singular  or  conspicuous  generosity  to 
the  park,  for  reasons  that  were  obvious  aud  honorable 
to  himself.  He  was  convinced  that  nothing  but  time 
and  trial  would  justify  the  purchase  of  the  park  and 


127 


the  expenditure  upon  it  of  any  considerable  sum.  But 
lie  intimated  more  than  once  that  some  help  would 
sooner  or  later  come,  if  it  was  likely  to  be  needed. 
When  the  time  came,  his  gift  was  ready.  He  had  ex¬ 
pected  that  $5,000  would  be  all  that  would  be  required, 
but  when  he  found  that  twice  the  sum  would  be  neces¬ 
sary,  he  gave  the  whole  with  equal  cheerfulness,  and 
the  progress  toward  completion,  with  its  evidence  of 
the  pleasure  and  surprise  which  the  use  of  the  drive 
furnished  so  many,  was  a  perpetual  delight  for  months 
before  his  death. 

To  his  friends  and  neighbors  he  abounded  in  kindness 
and  sympathy.  In  their  joys  and  sorrows  he  was  a 
thoughtful,  loving  friend.  His  words  and  aCts  were 
kindness  itself.  To  his  own  household  he  was  ten¬ 
der-hearted  and  overflowing  with  sympathy.  Noth¬ 
ing  hindered  the  expression  of  his  feelings  to  those 
nearest  and  more  remote,  except  the  sensitive  timidity 
which  was  characteristic  of  the  man.  Even  to  his 
own  children  his  love  was  too  sensitive  and  delicate 
to  bear  expression  by  words.  What  was  true  of  his 
feelings  towards  man  was  evidently  true  of  his  feel¬ 
ings  towards  God.  These  feelings  were  sensitively 
cherished  in  his  heart,  but  that  they  were  cherished 
most  sacredly  and  uprightly  there,  we  have  abundant 
evidence.  The  language  of  his  heart  was  “O  my 
soul  thou  hast  said  unto  the  Lord,  Thou  art  my  Lord. 
My  goodness  extendetli  not  to  Thee ;  but  to  the 
saints  that  are  in  the  earth,  and  the  excellent  in  whom 
is  all  my  delight.”  He  loved  Christian  men  and 
Christian  teachers,  and  devout  and  humble  women, 


128 


his  own  mother  pre-eminently.  He  delighted  in  the 
services  and  teachings  of  the  Christian  church,  in 
Christian  song  and  prayer.  He  was  steadfastly  in¬ 
terested  in  Christian  missions  at  home  and  abroad, 
contributing  largely  to  the  support  of  both.  To  his 
own  pastor  and  to  the  welfare  of  the  Center  church 
he  was  always  most  loyal  and  friendly,  and  never 
failed  to  be  present  in  his  place  as  a  devout  and  at¬ 
tentive  worshipper.  Many  reasons  from  the  history 
of  his  early  life  might  be  given  why  he  did  not  be¬ 
come  a  communicant  of  the  church,  but  that  he  not 
only  did  justly  and  loved  mercy,  but  walked  humbly 
with  God,  those  who  knew  him  most  intimately  be¬ 
lieve  most  firmly. 

His  last  days  were  days  of  eminent  blessing  and 
peace.  The  evening  of  the  closing  events  of  his  life 
was  singularly  happy  and  complete.  From  Tuesday 
till  Friday  previous,  he  had  been  in  Farmington,  where 
he  passed  much  of  his  time  for  the  first  fourteen  years 
of  his  residence  in  Connecticut,  and  where  he  married 
his  wife.  On  Saturday  he  traversed  the  Farnam 
Drive  to  its  termination,  and  enjoyed  fresh  and  more 
than  usual  gratification  at  the  evidence  that  it  was 
giving  delight  to  many.  On  his  return  he  called  at 
the  house  of  his  daughter,  Mrs.  Whitney,  to  give  his 
blessing  to  his  grandchildren  there,  then  visited  his 
oldest  son  in  his  sick  chamber,  and  greeted  his  chil¬ 
dren  after  their  recent  return  from  their  summer  home. 
After  dinner  he  was  solicitous  punctually  to  despatch 
his  accustomed  remittances  to  beloved  relatives  on 
their  appointed  day,  and  was  just  prepared  to  enjoy 


129 


his  evening’s  quiet,  when  he  was  summoned  to  the 
rest  which  remaineth  for  the  people  of  God.  After 
a  brief  paroxysm,  he  fell  into  an  untroubled  sleep,  and 
on  Thursday  at  noon  he  passed  from  earth,  which 
is  the  poorer  by  the  loss  of  a  man  whose  life  was  full 
of  blessings  and  benefits  to  his  kind  ;  leaving  to  his 
family  and  to  his  friends  his  loving  benedictions  and 
his  blessed  memory.  p. 

Yale  College. 


130 


An  editorial  from  The  Morning  News ,  October  5,  1883. 

New  Haven  has  suffered  within  two  or  three  years 
the  loss  of  several  distinguished  public  benefactors. 
No  greater  bereavement  remained  possible  than  that 
which  we  are  called  on  to  announce  to-day  in  the 
death  of  Mr.  Henry  Farnam.  The  events  of  his  use¬ 
ful  career  may  be  read  in  a  formal  biographical  sketch 
in  another  column,  but  we  cannot  refrain  from  here 
bearing  witness  to  the  peculiarly  grateful  estimation 
in  which  he  was  held  by  high  and  low,  as  New 
Haven’s  most  honored  and  representative  citizen. 
Along  with  his  friends  and  associates,  the  Trow¬ 
bridges  and  Sheffields,  he  will  be  remembered  to  all 
future  time,  as  one  of  the  men  who  have  made  New 
Haven  what  it  is,  the  metropolis  of  literature,  science, 
and  art,  of  this  portion  of  New  England.  As  the 
writer  of  the  obituary  sketch  truly  remarks,  it  is  not 
alone  by  his  benefadtions  to  Yale  College,  to  the  city 
charities,  and  to  works  of  public  improvement  and 
adornment,  that  his  memory  will  long  be  cherished  by 
hundreds  of  grateful  hearts. 

Charity  stands  at  the  head  of  the  Christian  roll  of 
virtues,  yet  there  have  been  many  great  public  and 
private  benefadtors  who  have  not  possessed  that  savoir 
faire  of  the  refined  and  polished  gentleman  whose  loss 
we  deplore.  The  recipient  of  his  bounty  was  not 
made  to  feel  himself  a  dependent,  bound  to  a  tribute 
of  recognition,  but  rather  as  a  co-laborer  and  partner 
in  the  work  of  advancing  the  objedt  which  had  called 
forth  the  contribution.  “  He  always  seemed,”  said 
Professor  Fisher  many  years  ago,  “  as  if  he  was  long- 

13* 


ing  to  offer  you  a  check  for  five  thousand  dollars.” 
This  remark  aptly  illustrated  the  character  of  Henry 
Farnam.  To  those  who  accepted  the  position  of 
trustees  of  his  great  public  gifts,  he  felt  a  positive 
gratitude,  and  to  them,  more  than  to  himself,  he 
ascribed  the  merit  of  the  foundations  which  will  per¬ 
petuate  his  name. 

From  another  point  of  view  his  career  was  exceed¬ 
ingly  interesting  and  instructive.  He  was  one  of  the 
last  remaining  links  connecting  us  with  the  heroic  age 
of  American  enterprise,  with  the  builders  of  the  Erie 
Canal,  the  constructors  of  the  first  western  railways, 
and  the  localization  of  the  great  western  centers  of 
population  and  traffic.  His  biograph}'  should  become 
popularly  known  for  the  instruction  and  guidance  of 
the  younger  generation,  and  his  statue  should  sur¬ 
mount  the  highest  point  of  that  noble  park  of  which 
he  was  the  chief  promoter. 


Ail  editorial  from  The  Palladium ,  Odtober  5,  1883. 

Nineteen  months  ago,  the  people  of  New  Haven 
were  called  upon  to  mourn  the  loss  of  an  eminent  cit¬ 
izen,  one  to  whom  his  day  and  generation  owed  much, 
and  whose  name  will  ever  be  held  in  honored  remem¬ 
brance  for  the  good  he  accomplished.  Again  the  peo¬ 
ple  are  called  upon  to  mourn,  another  eminent  citizen 
is  gone,  and  the  name  of  Farnam  is  written  beside  that 
of  Sheffield  in  the  list  of  the  departed.  Long  asso¬ 
ciated  together  in  business  life,  the  people  will  natu¬ 
rally  associate  them  together  in  death,  as  the  two  men 
in  this  community  who  were  always  first  in  good 
works,  prominent  above  others  in  their  public  spirit 
as  well  as  their  private  benevolence.  Elsewhere  we 
give  a  sketch  of  the  principal  events  in  the  life  of  Mr. 
Farnam,  which  imperfectly  discloses  something  of  the 
character  of  the  man.  Reared  under  circumstances 
far  removed  from  affluence,  necessity  early  compelled 
him  to  make  the  most  of  the  ability  God  had  given 
him.  Mr.  Farnam  was  what  is  popularly  termed  a 
self-made  man.  That  is,  it  was  neither  to  favor  nor 
to  fortune  that  he  owed  his  success  in  life.  He  earned 
it  by  his  own  unaided  exertion.  Beginning  a  humble 
“rodman,”  eking  out  his  small  salary  by  teaching 
school  in  the  winter  season,  he  grew  to  become  one  of 
the  best  known  railway  engineers  of  his  day,  amass¬ 
ing  a  fortune  in  the  process.  But  it  is  not  as  a  great 
railroad  builder,  or  as  a  wealthy  man  merely,  that 
Mr.  Farnam  will  be  longest  remembered.  His  public 
spirit,  his  private  benevolence,  and  his  strict  integrity 
gained  for  him  among  his  fellow  citizens  a  reputation 


133 


which  any  one  might  envy.  It  is  as  the  man'who  al¬ 
ways  stood  ready  to  assist  any  enterprise  intended  for 
the  public  good,  whose  purse  was  ever  open  to  the 
call  of  charity,  whose  name  was  universally  recognized 
as  the  very  best  indorsement  that  any  project,  public 
or  private,  could  have,  that  his  loss  will  be  most 
deeply  felt  in  this  community,  where  the  closing  }rears 
of  his  life  were  so  quietly  spent. 


•34 


From  The  Morning  News  of  October  io,  1883. 

The  annual  fall  parade  and  drill  of  the  Second 
Company  Governor’s  Horse  Guards  was  held  in  this 
city  yesterday.  At  10  o’clock  the  company  headed 
by  the  National  Band,  of  Wallingford,  marched  to  a 
lot  near  Howard  avenue  grounds  and  they  here  spent 
several  hours  in  drilling.  At  2  o’clock  they  partook 
of  dinner  at  the  Grand  Union  Hotel.  The  tables  were 
elaborately  spread,  and  the  bill  of  fare  was  very  ex¬ 
tensive,  comprising  all  the  delicacies  of  the  season. 
It  was  after  4  o’clock  when  the  guards  paraded 
through  the  principal  streets.  At  the  suggestion  of 
Mayor  Uewis,  the  company  escorted  its  invited  guests 
in  carriages  up  Farnam  Drive  to  the  summit  of  East 
Rock.  The  novel  sight  of  soldiers  on  horseback 
marching  up  the  drive  and  the  music  of  the  band  at¬ 
tracted  many  visitors.  When  Major  Strong,  who  was 
in  command,  had  marched  his  horsemen  to  the  top, 
and  had  faced  them  toward  the  city,  ex- Quartermaster 
John  G.  Nortli  presented  the  following  resolutions  : 

Resolved ,  That  the  late  Henry  Farnam,  by  his 
munificent  donation  of  this  beautiful  drive  to  East 
Rock  Park,  has  endeared  himself  to  all  who  love  New 
Haven. 

Resolved ,  That  this  company  has  made  this  informal 
visit  to  dedicate  this  Drive  to  one  who,  though  he  has 
gone  from  us,  will  be  remembered  and  honored  as 
long  as  these  rocks  remain  to  bear  up  his  handiwork. 

Mayor  Eewis,  Postmaster  Sperry,  President  Porter, 
of  Yale,  Major-General  William  H.  Russell,  and 
Major  H.  H.  Strong,  responded  in  words  fitting  to  the 
occasion. 

>35 


Resolutions,  adopted  by  the  Common  Council  of  the  City  of 
New  Haven,  October  8,  1883. 

The  City  of  New  Haven  by  its  Court  of  Common 
Council  desires  to  place  upon  record  its  deep  sense  of 
the  great  loss  which  this  community  has  suffered  in 
the  death  of  Henry  Farnam.  He  has  built  for  him¬ 
self  an  enduring  monument  in  his  liberal  gifts  of  time 
and  money  to  Fast  Rock  Park.  Yet  more  lasting 
will  be  the  priceless  memory  of  his  incessant  flow  of 
generosity  to  all  charitable  objedts,  to  the  deserving- 
poor,  and  in  every  direction  where  mankind  could  be 
made  happier  or  better.  A  peaceful  death,  closed  a 
life  conspicuously  filled  with  good  works.  The 
Mayor  is  directed  to  express  to  Mrs.  Farnam,  in  the 
name  of  the  city,  the  sorrow  so  universally  felt. 


136 


